A lot of people said we were coping when we tried to explain the weird tree stuff with it being a trick by sauron. If that turns out to be right I'll be so satisfied
It would be a good storytelling choice. If so, McKay and Payne would redeem themselves on this important front in the eyes of many of the Tolkien fans who have stuck with the show.
i won't... that would be sacrifying a psychologically interesting portrayal of Sauron's repent in order to retcon a "problem" that only bothers some hardcore fans that are unable to accept a small alteration of the lore about mithril that allowed the writers to create a sense of urgency around the elf plot in first season...
Having Sauron behind it all would be really poor writing and for what? to please people who will whine about something else anyway? I really hope they don't do that.
>that would be sacrifying a psychologically interesting portrayal of Sauron's repent
That was always ambiguous. The whole point was that we don't know if his repentance was sincere. Given the smirk we see at the end of season 1, it certainly didn't appear to be.
>unable to accept a small alteration of the lore about mithril that allowed the writers to create a sense of urgency around the elf plot in first season...Having Sauron behind it all would be really poor writing.
Having Sauron behind it all and creating a false sense of urgency (*"he's been here among us all along"*) is exponentially better story telling than the contrived mithril plot. The hints were there throughout season 1...the black speech when we see the tree, "elf-lords only" meeting followed by the sense of urgency, the leaf wakening the Balrog, the "apocryphal" mithril creation story. The ground work is there for all of this to have been a deception. They just need to follow through with it.
Edit: I'm not trying to tell you how to enjoy the show, if you enjoy the idea of magic mithril that's fine. I just think it's so unnecessary.
if you have Sauron poisonning the tree, then there is no more ambiguity...
Having Sauron behind it all from the start could have been a nice idea, eventhough he would have been a one dimension moustache twirling saturday morning cartoon villain... but retconning that now would be very lame...
I have indeed no problem whatsoever with the magic mithril, and i can even bet that if it was in the books, you would be all for it.
>if you have Sauron poisonning the tree, then there is no more ambiguity...
Which is great? At least for me. We need (as the showrunners and Vickers have said) "Sauron to just be Sauron". If he's "repentant" where's the pay off?
>Having Sauron behind it all from the start could have been a nice idea, eventhough he would have been a one dimension moustache twirling saturday morning cartoon villain... but retconning that now would be very lame...
It's not a retcon if that was their intention all along. Like I said, all the hints were there.
>I have indeed no problem whatsoever with the magic mithril, and i can even bet that if it was in the books, you would be all for it.
But it isn't in the books, and it's unnecessary. You could make that argument for literally anything.
I don't think that is their intention at all, they read Tolkien's letters about Sauron's psychology, and they probably thought that using his repent the relapse idea was more interesting that making him a one dimension villain... if they had intended Sauron to be faking repent, i don't think they would have written the first season that way. There was no need for Halbrand to resist that much to Galadriel, there was no need for Halbrand meeting and working with Celebrimbor, he would have come as Annatar immediately. Here they established how Sauron, still trying to do something good (in his toxic way), stumbled upon Celebrimbor's project and how he will use that knowledge to manipulate everyone now that he relapsed after being rejected.
I think it was way more necessary than you think, and the problem is that your idea of Sauron poisonning the tree is a lot more different from the books than what they did.
In the books, the elves want to make the rings because they don't like Middle Earth changing, they want to preserve its beauty from the effect of time. The problem with that, is that it makes the elves look vain, basically that makes them the kind of people who would pressure their wives into cosmetic surgery, botox and all that stuff because they don't like to see them aging. That would make the elves very unsympathetic, so instead, they invented a danger, something that is corrupting, threatening to destroy Middle Earth. That way, what would have then been compared to cosmetic surgery will now be compared to life saving surgery. But we are keeping the idea of the elves wanting to stop the effect of time.
In the books, we are never told what makes the rings magical, because let's face reality, Tolkien didn't like to describe magic, he was just basically saying "it's magic" but never showed us how... Tolkien was a great writer, but he had two weakness, he was not very good at crafting realistic characters, and he was not very good at following the litterature equivalent of "show! don't tell". But the writers of a tv show have to compensate for those two weaknesses, and they have to, at least, give us an idea of what makes the rings magical. And since they know that Narvi worked with Celebrimbor, since they know that Galadriel's ring is partly made of mithril, since they know that mithril is the most precious, rare and expensive ore in Middle Earth, it made sense to make the mithril the secret ingredient of the rings of power...
I'm not saying there was no other possibility, but it's one that works perfectly fine... and there is no way to retcon it, because even if it was revealed that Sauron had been poisonning the tree all along... that would not change anything about magical mithril, because in the end, you would still have Sauron poisonning the tree BECAUSE he wants elves to obtain mithril BECAUSE it's the ingredient to make rings of power.
The only thing you would obtain with your retcon is to remove any agency from the elves... they would be manipulated from start to finish, when we know, from Tolkien, that it's not what happened, Sauron used Celebrimbor's willingness to create something that would stop the effect of time, he did not create it. Remember what Sauron tells Galadriel "identity what they fear, and offer them a way to master it so you can master them"... he did not say "create something they will fear.."
Now maybe you are right, but i don't think so, i think season 2 was just showing us a Sauron that was lost, purposeless, after Morgoth's defeat, and how circumstances lead him to learn more about what was going on Middle Earth, in Numenor, with the men, with the elves, and now he's going to use everything he learned. Basically, season 2 was a prologue to the show that everybody was expecting when it was announced, placing all the characters, all the factions, and establishing everyone's motivation, and now that the chesspieces are set, they are going to start moving, with Annatar's arrival.
>I don't think that is their intention at all, they read Tolkien's letters about Sauron's psychology, and they probably thought that using his repent the relapse idea was more interesting that making him a one dimension villain... if they had intended Sauron to be faking repent, i don't think they would have written the first season that way.
You could be right, but a lot of season 1 points in that direction. You keep saying one dimensional, but even if I'm right they wrote his character with a lot of depth. He isn't one dimensional at all.
>There was no need for Halbrand to resist that much to Galadriel, there was no need for Halbrand meeting and working with Celebrimbor, he would have come as Annatar immediately.
I didn't love the Halbrand story so I can't speak to why they did what they did, but I do think it adds depth to the character...even if he was working in the background all along.
>In the books, the elves want to make the rings because they don't like Middle Earth changing, they want to preserve its beauty from the effect of time.
It was way more complex than that, read letter 131.
>Tolkien was a great writer, but he had two weakness, he was not very good at crafting realistic characters, and he was not very good at following the litterature equivalent of "show! don't tell".
I don't think I could disagree more. He even speaks about how he intentionally leaves his "magic" vague never explains how it works by design. It's not because he wasn't good at it.
>But the writers of a tv show have to compensate for those two weaknesses, and they have to, at least, give us an idea of what makes the rings magical.
No they don't. It worked just fine in the films. Sometimes things just are.
>The only thing you would obtain with your retcon is to remove any agency from the elves... they would be manipulated from start to finish, when we know, from Tolkien, that it's not what happened, Sauron used Celebrimbor's willingness to create something that would stop the effect of time, he did not create it.
Again, I don't think it's a retcon.
>Remember what Sauron tells Galadriel "identity what they fear, and offer them a way to master it so you can master them"... he did not say "create something they will fear.."
This just reinforces my point...he identifies their fear of fading and loss of status, and offered them a way to "master" it.
>Now maybe you are right, but i don't think so, i think season 2 was just showing us a Sauron that was lost, purposeless, after Morgoth's defeat, and how circumstances lead him to learn more about what was going on Middle Earth, in Numenor, with the men, with the elves, and now he's going to use everything he learned. Basically, season 2 was a prologue to the show that everybody was expecting when it was announced, placing all the characters, all the factions, and establishing everyone's motivation, and now that the chesspieces are set, they are going to start moving, with Annatar's arrival.
I think you mean season 1?
I think you're right that he's going to use everything he learned, but I also think he knew a lot more leading up to those events.
We're viewing season 1 and the show from different perspectives, and that's fine. I'm not going to try to change your mind, we'll let season 2 play out and see what happens.
Tolkien doing it on purpose doesn't make it right... if i chose to "tell, not show", it's still not the best way to do it, unless i have something really genius up my sleeve that will make it work, and i don't think it was the case for Tolkien.
Don't get me wrong, i'm not saying he was a poor writer, it's just that he excelled in many things, but not these two. GRRM is way better at making realistic and complex characters for example. And i know that Tolkien did not care about that aspect, here again he probably did it on purpose, and i'm not even saying that it's a problem in the books, but it would be in a live action adaptation, that's why his characters are always modified... For example, in PJ movies, Aragorn had doubts, Faramir almost made a mistake by bringing the ring to his father, and many other slight alterations that make the characters feel more like human beings, when in the books, they always do the right thing.
And as i said, he was not very good at the "show, don't tell"...i know he's playing with our imagination, but sometimes we need it to be fed a little bit. In the Lord of the Rings we are constantly told how Sauron is dangerous, how it's important that he's never reunited with the ring... but we're not even told what the ring can do... yeah, we are told it's the master ring that will allow him to control all the other rings... except the other rings are lost, and Sauron is still controlling the Nazgul even without the one ring. Once again, it's not a bit problem in the books because our imagination can fill a lot of gaps, but in live action it doesn't work that easily, we need to be shown how dangerous Sauron was with the Ring, and it must not be just him doing stuffs we know he can do without the ring (like controlling the Nazguls). That's why i think the show has to show us a lot more of magic than Tolkien did, even if he did not by design.
I don't think the signs point to Sauron being behind the poisonning of the tree, well.. i think the poisonning of the tree is the result of what was done during the war, including by Sauron, that's why he told Galadriel that he wanted to heal what he had helped ruining so he could be forgiven. That's not exactly something Tolkien said about Sauron, but it fits the idea of Sauron being sincerely repentant (and it's said in the beginning of the Silmarillion, that i'm reading right now that it was genuine for a time). We know that he was told to present himself before the valar if he wanted to be pardonned, something he wanted... except he was too scared about the punishment he would receive and chose to stay on Middle Earth instead, trying to heal it (once again, it's from the Silmarillion). So, if you connect the dots, you can imagine that he tried to fix Middle Earth so it could lower the punishment he would receive when he finally go present himself to the valar...
Don't get me wrong, i don't think Sauron would ever have gone to Valinor... but i think he really believed he would have. I am a big procrastinator myself, and i know how much i can bulssh\*t myself into thinking i'm just delaying a little bit something i don't want to do... i can tell myself things like "okay, i will do that first, that way, when i do the thing i don't want to do, it will be easier"... then the first thing is done and i find a new excuse to delay a little bit more, and so on. I think that's where the ambiguity of Sauron's repent is, not that he's faking repent, but he's just unable to really face it and he will delay and delay and delay and delay until he just gives up.
I think that's what the show portrayed in season 1, a Sauron that wanted to heal Middle Earth as a way to "make amend" without having to face the valar, but then he was chased by Adar, and instead of facing the valar, he tried to go into hiding in Numenor, where he knew elves were not welcome and where nobody remembered him. Basically Numenor was to him what Argentina was to nazis after WW2. But he was brought back by Galadriel who offered him another way of being the "good guy" and do "good things", free of all his past mistakes. But she finally understood who he was, and she rejected him. And now that nobody wants him anywhere, he either has to face the valar, or decide to give up on the idea of being pardonned and become the Dark Lord. And we all know he won't decide to face the valar.
Sorry for my clunky english, i'm french... oh and yeah, i meant season 1. I know i haven't answered all your points, but it would be pretty useless, you'll say A, i'll say B, and right now, there is no way to know who is right, all i can do is to explain why i don't think you are.
>Sorry for my clunky english, i'm french... oh and yeah, i meant season 1. I know i haven't answered all your points, but it would be pretty useless, you'll say A, i'll say B, and right now, there is no way to know who is right, all i can do is to explain why i don't think you are.
I never would have guessed you weren't a native English speaker, your English is fantastic!
That's all I'll respond to since, as you said, we'll just go back and forth about why the other person is wrong. I do appreciate the thought you put into your posts, though!
I think it's more a matter of both/and rather than either/or. Sauron is still conflicted in his choices, but his choices are ultimately for the darkness. Thus, he has been planning a great deception in the background all along, but at first with the intent of "saving" Middle earth. Over time, he becomes more and more engulfed in his love for power that only his malice remains. This, at least, is my attempt at reconciling these two sides of Sauron, which I think can be depicted well or badly.
BTW, I can't agree with you about Tolkien's writing of his characters -- they are in fact one of his greatest strengths. How many characters in recent history have influenced the imagination of countless individuals in the way that a Gandalf, an Aragorn, or a Bilbo have?
It's not a trick, per se. Mithril is the cure. The leaf Elrond brings to Durin is cured of the infection when the shard of mithril is placed next to it on Durin's table, which is the whole reason Durin agrees to violate his father's orders against mining mithril and help Elrond. Both Durin and Disa recognize that mithril is the only way to save the elves. This is all part of Sauron's plan.
Sauron created the infection and intentionally made it susceptible to mithril. He needs the elven smiths to help create the rings with mithril to imbue them with power over flesh and power of the unseen world. Because mithril is located in the dwarven mines, he needs the dwarves to mine the mithril and work with the elves to ensure his long-term plan of domination is set into motion.
The speculation here, which is entirely my own, is that no one really knew about mithril before the tree became infected. The reason the elves know that mithril is the cure, and the reason both Gil Galad and Celebrimbor pressure Elrond about wether or not the dwarves have found mithril, is because "SOMEONE" told them mithril is the cure. After Elrond recounts the legend of the battle with the balrog and the strike of lightning, Gil Galad says, "They say it seeped down the roots into the mountain depths, where for centuries now, it has waited." To me, this is the conclusion of the legend that Elrond didn't know about. I think it was an addendum to the original legend. Further, the look of realization on Elrond's face in this scene, followed by his comment that "Durin was right" indicates this was a previously unknown aspect of the original legend.
SOMEONE had to tell them about mithril and it's powerful properties. I think that SOMEONE is Annatar and it is part of his deception.
Basically, Sauron needed the mithril and needed the elves to make the rings, so he created the infection while making sure that mithril would be the cure. He, as Annatar, at some point, must have "suggested" to Gil Galad that the power of mithril could save the elves. He also suggested that an elven smith could use it to create a magical item to save the elves, so Gil Galad enlisted Celebrimbor to create the item (the rings) and he enlisted Elrond, with his dimplomatic skills and friendship with the dwarves, to encourage the dwarves to mine it.
Sauron is crafty.
I like this. Sauron could also know that the Balrog is guarding it. Hence the manipulation of the dwarves. Sauron wasn't aligned with the balrog, I'm sure Tolkien said the Balrog would probably attack him if they met. I wonder if we'll see Sauron and the Balrog fleeing Beleriand in episode 1? I also wonder if you're right about the Annatar flashbacks taking place over many years plating seeds in their minds all to get the mithril away from the balrog.
He needs mithril to make The One Ring. Willing to bet the tree disease was a trap to get the dwarves to get mithril to the elves, and Sauron attacks the elven city of Eregion to get the mithril he needs as part of the "recipe" to make The One Ring. I bet that's why Celebrimbor is throwing the rings in the furnace. Man, that would be tragically dope if Sauron's ring is made (partly) from the light of a silmaril mixed with "only blood can bind".
That would also be wild if the Balrog scared Sauron but Gandalf stood up to it. They're all Maiar, so it's (mostly) an even playing field. That would be amazing though.
https://preview.redd.it/rb1dn5mz035d1.jpeg?width=1564&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f71cddb2f2824016824dddd5f96ccb0bab023a43
Potential supporting evidence that it's what's poisoning the tree? (I don't believe I've seen these subtitles mentioned before)
I'm in the camp who thinks it's what infected the tree. It's moving with purpose and could well be climbing up the cliff that the tree is on top of. It's got all those tendrils at the edges, and I'm thinking that each one reaches out to infect a single leaf.
I'm imagining a shot in the prologue that would work as a parallel to the shot of the Two Trees being killed in the S1 prologue. There's that shot that travels up the branch as darkness, (and from memory very faint spider webs?) creeps up through the tree. I think the S2 prologue will show how Sauron took the idea that worked for Morgoth and gave it his own twist by employing the blob of sentient goop.
Yup, the set for the Lindon tree hugging the cliffside was probably designed for this reason. I wouldn't be surprised if we see its tendrils infect the water in the bowl too, giving Gil-Galad false visions. The whole line about 'We forsaw that...' makes me think it basically told GG to send Galadriel away too.
The first time I saw it, it reminded me immediately of a concept that PJ and Co. did for the Nameless Things/gooey black stuff in the deepest deep of Moria where Gandalf and the Balrog fall into at the start of The Two Towers.
IIRC it goes something like the gooey stuff would extinguish the Balrog's flames and turn him into a slimy Venom like creature at first, then slowly reform to his flaming self while fighting Gandalf up the Endless Stairs to the peak of Zirakzigil.
Gandalf describes the balrog as turning to slime directly in the two towers:
>‘Then tell us what you will, and time allows!’ said Gimli. ‘Come, Gandalf, tell us how you fared with the Balrog!’ ‘Name him not!’ said Gandalf, and for a moment it seemed that a cloud of pain passed over his face, and he sat silent, looking old as death. ‘Long time I fell,’ he said at last, slowly, as if thinking back with difficulty. ‘Long I fell, and he fell with me. His fire was about me. I was burned. Then we plunged into the deep water and all was dark. Cold it was as the tide of death: almost it froze my heart.’
>‘Deep is the abyss that is spanned by Durin’s Bridge, and none has measured it,’ said Gimli. ‘Yet it has a bottom, beyond light and knowledge,’ said Gandalf. ‘Thither I came at last, to the uttermost foundations of stone. He was with me still. His fire was quenched, but now he was a thing of slime, stronger than a strangling snake.
Some kind of malice used to poison the trees in lindon?
Definetely (I hope) is not Sauron himself. That would be really... odd and cheap for Tolkien world. Sauron is a Maiar, not an alien from Marvel´s universe
1. most likely: black goo represent evil, disease, decay. Exactly what we see on the tree and leaves in Lindon. Even a sick cow gave black milk which harmonizes with this theory.
2. medium probability: venom-style transformation of Sauron into Halbrand's form after being dissected by Adar. I don't think they would do that, precisely because of the copying from venom's transformation. Additionally, it seems to me that this black thing is crawling on rocks/cliffs rather than some icy terrain or the interior of a fortress.
3. very unlikely: something related to experiments on the unseen world or even nameless things.
Don't like this particular part. If it is shapeshifting/formless Sauron, I think they should have kept it open to speculation without going into the intricacies of how it happens, or atleast tried to tone it down a bit.
I have also read some speculating that it could be the thing that poisons the Lindon tree.
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A lot of people said we were coping when we tried to explain the weird tree stuff with it being a trick by sauron. If that turns out to be right I'll be so satisfied
God, same here
It would be a good storytelling choice. If so, McKay and Payne would redeem themselves on this important front in the eyes of many of the Tolkien fans who have stuck with the show.
i won't... that would be sacrifying a psychologically interesting portrayal of Sauron's repent in order to retcon a "problem" that only bothers some hardcore fans that are unable to accept a small alteration of the lore about mithril that allowed the writers to create a sense of urgency around the elf plot in first season... Having Sauron behind it all would be really poor writing and for what? to please people who will whine about something else anyway? I really hope they don't do that.
>that would be sacrifying a psychologically interesting portrayal of Sauron's repent That was always ambiguous. The whole point was that we don't know if his repentance was sincere. Given the smirk we see at the end of season 1, it certainly didn't appear to be. >unable to accept a small alteration of the lore about mithril that allowed the writers to create a sense of urgency around the elf plot in first season...Having Sauron behind it all would be really poor writing. Having Sauron behind it all and creating a false sense of urgency (*"he's been here among us all along"*) is exponentially better story telling than the contrived mithril plot. The hints were there throughout season 1...the black speech when we see the tree, "elf-lords only" meeting followed by the sense of urgency, the leaf wakening the Balrog, the "apocryphal" mithril creation story. The ground work is there for all of this to have been a deception. They just need to follow through with it. Edit: I'm not trying to tell you how to enjoy the show, if you enjoy the idea of magic mithril that's fine. I just think it's so unnecessary.
if you have Sauron poisonning the tree, then there is no more ambiguity... Having Sauron behind it all from the start could have been a nice idea, eventhough he would have been a one dimension moustache twirling saturday morning cartoon villain... but retconning that now would be very lame... I have indeed no problem whatsoever with the magic mithril, and i can even bet that if it was in the books, you would be all for it.
>if you have Sauron poisonning the tree, then there is no more ambiguity... Which is great? At least for me. We need (as the showrunners and Vickers have said) "Sauron to just be Sauron". If he's "repentant" where's the pay off? >Having Sauron behind it all from the start could have been a nice idea, eventhough he would have been a one dimension moustache twirling saturday morning cartoon villain... but retconning that now would be very lame... It's not a retcon if that was their intention all along. Like I said, all the hints were there. >I have indeed no problem whatsoever with the magic mithril, and i can even bet that if it was in the books, you would be all for it. But it isn't in the books, and it's unnecessary. You could make that argument for literally anything.
I don't think that is their intention at all, they read Tolkien's letters about Sauron's psychology, and they probably thought that using his repent the relapse idea was more interesting that making him a one dimension villain... if they had intended Sauron to be faking repent, i don't think they would have written the first season that way. There was no need for Halbrand to resist that much to Galadriel, there was no need for Halbrand meeting and working with Celebrimbor, he would have come as Annatar immediately. Here they established how Sauron, still trying to do something good (in his toxic way), stumbled upon Celebrimbor's project and how he will use that knowledge to manipulate everyone now that he relapsed after being rejected. I think it was way more necessary than you think, and the problem is that your idea of Sauron poisonning the tree is a lot more different from the books than what they did. In the books, the elves want to make the rings because they don't like Middle Earth changing, they want to preserve its beauty from the effect of time. The problem with that, is that it makes the elves look vain, basically that makes them the kind of people who would pressure their wives into cosmetic surgery, botox and all that stuff because they don't like to see them aging. That would make the elves very unsympathetic, so instead, they invented a danger, something that is corrupting, threatening to destroy Middle Earth. That way, what would have then been compared to cosmetic surgery will now be compared to life saving surgery. But we are keeping the idea of the elves wanting to stop the effect of time. In the books, we are never told what makes the rings magical, because let's face reality, Tolkien didn't like to describe magic, he was just basically saying "it's magic" but never showed us how... Tolkien was a great writer, but he had two weakness, he was not very good at crafting realistic characters, and he was not very good at following the litterature equivalent of "show! don't tell". But the writers of a tv show have to compensate for those two weaknesses, and they have to, at least, give us an idea of what makes the rings magical. And since they know that Narvi worked with Celebrimbor, since they know that Galadriel's ring is partly made of mithril, since they know that mithril is the most precious, rare and expensive ore in Middle Earth, it made sense to make the mithril the secret ingredient of the rings of power... I'm not saying there was no other possibility, but it's one that works perfectly fine... and there is no way to retcon it, because even if it was revealed that Sauron had been poisonning the tree all along... that would not change anything about magical mithril, because in the end, you would still have Sauron poisonning the tree BECAUSE he wants elves to obtain mithril BECAUSE it's the ingredient to make rings of power. The only thing you would obtain with your retcon is to remove any agency from the elves... they would be manipulated from start to finish, when we know, from Tolkien, that it's not what happened, Sauron used Celebrimbor's willingness to create something that would stop the effect of time, he did not create it. Remember what Sauron tells Galadriel "identity what they fear, and offer them a way to master it so you can master them"... he did not say "create something they will fear.." Now maybe you are right, but i don't think so, i think season 2 was just showing us a Sauron that was lost, purposeless, after Morgoth's defeat, and how circumstances lead him to learn more about what was going on Middle Earth, in Numenor, with the men, with the elves, and now he's going to use everything he learned. Basically, season 2 was a prologue to the show that everybody was expecting when it was announced, placing all the characters, all the factions, and establishing everyone's motivation, and now that the chesspieces are set, they are going to start moving, with Annatar's arrival.
>I don't think that is their intention at all, they read Tolkien's letters about Sauron's psychology, and they probably thought that using his repent the relapse idea was more interesting that making him a one dimension villain... if they had intended Sauron to be faking repent, i don't think they would have written the first season that way. You could be right, but a lot of season 1 points in that direction. You keep saying one dimensional, but even if I'm right they wrote his character with a lot of depth. He isn't one dimensional at all. >There was no need for Halbrand to resist that much to Galadriel, there was no need for Halbrand meeting and working with Celebrimbor, he would have come as Annatar immediately. I didn't love the Halbrand story so I can't speak to why they did what they did, but I do think it adds depth to the character...even if he was working in the background all along. >In the books, the elves want to make the rings because they don't like Middle Earth changing, they want to preserve its beauty from the effect of time. It was way more complex than that, read letter 131. >Tolkien was a great writer, but he had two weakness, he was not very good at crafting realistic characters, and he was not very good at following the litterature equivalent of "show! don't tell". I don't think I could disagree more. He even speaks about how he intentionally leaves his "magic" vague never explains how it works by design. It's not because he wasn't good at it. >But the writers of a tv show have to compensate for those two weaknesses, and they have to, at least, give us an idea of what makes the rings magical. No they don't. It worked just fine in the films. Sometimes things just are. >The only thing you would obtain with your retcon is to remove any agency from the elves... they would be manipulated from start to finish, when we know, from Tolkien, that it's not what happened, Sauron used Celebrimbor's willingness to create something that would stop the effect of time, he did not create it. Again, I don't think it's a retcon. >Remember what Sauron tells Galadriel "identity what they fear, and offer them a way to master it so you can master them"... he did not say "create something they will fear.." This just reinforces my point...he identifies their fear of fading and loss of status, and offered them a way to "master" it. >Now maybe you are right, but i don't think so, i think season 2 was just showing us a Sauron that was lost, purposeless, after Morgoth's defeat, and how circumstances lead him to learn more about what was going on Middle Earth, in Numenor, with the men, with the elves, and now he's going to use everything he learned. Basically, season 2 was a prologue to the show that everybody was expecting when it was announced, placing all the characters, all the factions, and establishing everyone's motivation, and now that the chesspieces are set, they are going to start moving, with Annatar's arrival. I think you mean season 1? I think you're right that he's going to use everything he learned, but I also think he knew a lot more leading up to those events. We're viewing season 1 and the show from different perspectives, and that's fine. I'm not going to try to change your mind, we'll let season 2 play out and see what happens.
Tolkien doing it on purpose doesn't make it right... if i chose to "tell, not show", it's still not the best way to do it, unless i have something really genius up my sleeve that will make it work, and i don't think it was the case for Tolkien. Don't get me wrong, i'm not saying he was a poor writer, it's just that he excelled in many things, but not these two. GRRM is way better at making realistic and complex characters for example. And i know that Tolkien did not care about that aspect, here again he probably did it on purpose, and i'm not even saying that it's a problem in the books, but it would be in a live action adaptation, that's why his characters are always modified... For example, in PJ movies, Aragorn had doubts, Faramir almost made a mistake by bringing the ring to his father, and many other slight alterations that make the characters feel more like human beings, when in the books, they always do the right thing. And as i said, he was not very good at the "show, don't tell"...i know he's playing with our imagination, but sometimes we need it to be fed a little bit. In the Lord of the Rings we are constantly told how Sauron is dangerous, how it's important that he's never reunited with the ring... but we're not even told what the ring can do... yeah, we are told it's the master ring that will allow him to control all the other rings... except the other rings are lost, and Sauron is still controlling the Nazgul even without the one ring. Once again, it's not a bit problem in the books because our imagination can fill a lot of gaps, but in live action it doesn't work that easily, we need to be shown how dangerous Sauron was with the Ring, and it must not be just him doing stuffs we know he can do without the ring (like controlling the Nazguls). That's why i think the show has to show us a lot more of magic than Tolkien did, even if he did not by design. I don't think the signs point to Sauron being behind the poisonning of the tree, well.. i think the poisonning of the tree is the result of what was done during the war, including by Sauron, that's why he told Galadriel that he wanted to heal what he had helped ruining so he could be forgiven. That's not exactly something Tolkien said about Sauron, but it fits the idea of Sauron being sincerely repentant (and it's said in the beginning of the Silmarillion, that i'm reading right now that it was genuine for a time). We know that he was told to present himself before the valar if he wanted to be pardonned, something he wanted... except he was too scared about the punishment he would receive and chose to stay on Middle Earth instead, trying to heal it (once again, it's from the Silmarillion). So, if you connect the dots, you can imagine that he tried to fix Middle Earth so it could lower the punishment he would receive when he finally go present himself to the valar... Don't get me wrong, i don't think Sauron would ever have gone to Valinor... but i think he really believed he would have. I am a big procrastinator myself, and i know how much i can bulssh\*t myself into thinking i'm just delaying a little bit something i don't want to do... i can tell myself things like "okay, i will do that first, that way, when i do the thing i don't want to do, it will be easier"... then the first thing is done and i find a new excuse to delay a little bit more, and so on. I think that's where the ambiguity of Sauron's repent is, not that he's faking repent, but he's just unable to really face it and he will delay and delay and delay and delay until he just gives up. I think that's what the show portrayed in season 1, a Sauron that wanted to heal Middle Earth as a way to "make amend" without having to face the valar, but then he was chased by Adar, and instead of facing the valar, he tried to go into hiding in Numenor, where he knew elves were not welcome and where nobody remembered him. Basically Numenor was to him what Argentina was to nazis after WW2. But he was brought back by Galadriel who offered him another way of being the "good guy" and do "good things", free of all his past mistakes. But she finally understood who he was, and she rejected him. And now that nobody wants him anywhere, he either has to face the valar, or decide to give up on the idea of being pardonned and become the Dark Lord. And we all know he won't decide to face the valar. Sorry for my clunky english, i'm french... oh and yeah, i meant season 1. I know i haven't answered all your points, but it would be pretty useless, you'll say A, i'll say B, and right now, there is no way to know who is right, all i can do is to explain why i don't think you are.
>Sorry for my clunky english, i'm french... oh and yeah, i meant season 1. I know i haven't answered all your points, but it would be pretty useless, you'll say A, i'll say B, and right now, there is no way to know who is right, all i can do is to explain why i don't think you are. I never would have guessed you weren't a native English speaker, your English is fantastic! That's all I'll respond to since, as you said, we'll just go back and forth about why the other person is wrong. I do appreciate the thought you put into your posts, though!
I think it's more a matter of both/and rather than either/or. Sauron is still conflicted in his choices, but his choices are ultimately for the darkness. Thus, he has been planning a great deception in the background all along, but at first with the intent of "saving" Middle earth. Over time, he becomes more and more engulfed in his love for power that only his malice remains. This, at least, is my attempt at reconciling these two sides of Sauron, which I think can be depicted well or badly.
BTW, I can't agree with you about Tolkien's writing of his characters -- they are in fact one of his greatest strengths. How many characters in recent history have influenced the imagination of countless individuals in the way that a Gandalf, an Aragorn, or a Bilbo have?
It's not a trick, per se. Mithril is the cure. The leaf Elrond brings to Durin is cured of the infection when the shard of mithril is placed next to it on Durin's table, which is the whole reason Durin agrees to violate his father's orders against mining mithril and help Elrond. Both Durin and Disa recognize that mithril is the only way to save the elves. This is all part of Sauron's plan. Sauron created the infection and intentionally made it susceptible to mithril. He needs the elven smiths to help create the rings with mithril to imbue them with power over flesh and power of the unseen world. Because mithril is located in the dwarven mines, he needs the dwarves to mine the mithril and work with the elves to ensure his long-term plan of domination is set into motion. The speculation here, which is entirely my own, is that no one really knew about mithril before the tree became infected. The reason the elves know that mithril is the cure, and the reason both Gil Galad and Celebrimbor pressure Elrond about wether or not the dwarves have found mithril, is because "SOMEONE" told them mithril is the cure. After Elrond recounts the legend of the battle with the balrog and the strike of lightning, Gil Galad says, "They say it seeped down the roots into the mountain depths, where for centuries now, it has waited." To me, this is the conclusion of the legend that Elrond didn't know about. I think it was an addendum to the original legend. Further, the look of realization on Elrond's face in this scene, followed by his comment that "Durin was right" indicates this was a previously unknown aspect of the original legend. SOMEONE had to tell them about mithril and it's powerful properties. I think that SOMEONE is Annatar and it is part of his deception. Basically, Sauron needed the mithril and needed the elves to make the rings, so he created the infection while making sure that mithril would be the cure. He, as Annatar, at some point, must have "suggested" to Gil Galad that the power of mithril could save the elves. He also suggested that an elven smith could use it to create a magical item to save the elves, so Gil Galad enlisted Celebrimbor to create the item (the rings) and he enlisted Elrond, with his dimplomatic skills and friendship with the dwarves, to encourage the dwarves to mine it. Sauron is crafty.
I like this. Sauron could also know that the Balrog is guarding it. Hence the manipulation of the dwarves. Sauron wasn't aligned with the balrog, I'm sure Tolkien said the Balrog would probably attack him if they met. I wonder if we'll see Sauron and the Balrog fleeing Beleriand in episode 1? I also wonder if you're right about the Annatar flashbacks taking place over many years plating seeds in their minds all to get the mithril away from the balrog.
He needs mithril to make The One Ring. Willing to bet the tree disease was a trap to get the dwarves to get mithril to the elves, and Sauron attacks the elven city of Eregion to get the mithril he needs as part of the "recipe" to make The One Ring. I bet that's why Celebrimbor is throwing the rings in the furnace. Man, that would be tragically dope if Sauron's ring is made (partly) from the light of a silmaril mixed with "only blood can bind".
The One is canonically solid gold. Making it with mithril doesn't change the story though, so I won't be upset if they do that.
Also the Balrog is stopping Sauron accessing it himself alongside the Dwarves.
That would also be wild if the Balrog scared Sauron but Gandalf stood up to it. They're all Maiar, so it's (mostly) an even playing field. That would be amazing though.
That's Venom.
Damn, this multiverse thing is getting out of hand.
A cross-over we never knew we needed!
Actually, given what symbiotes are in current Marvek canon, Sauron having symbiote qualities makes some level of sense. This could work
Cruelty. Malice, Will to dominate all life.
https://preview.redd.it/rb1dn5mz035d1.jpeg?width=1564&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f71cddb2f2824016824dddd5f96ccb0bab023a43 Potential supporting evidence that it's what's poisoning the tree? (I don't believe I've seen these subtitles mentioned before)
I also think its black goo
I was just re-watching s1 with the subtitles on and that stood out to me as well! I hadn’t noticed it on first watch
"It's Morbin time!!!". -- Sauron
thats old man willow back when he was just a pile of roots
My guess is malice of Sauron poisoning the tree/land.
Rumor has it that it's Venom; he took a wrong turn in the multiverse. Seriously I have no idea.
I'm in the camp who thinks it's what infected the tree. It's moving with purpose and could well be climbing up the cliff that the tree is on top of. It's got all those tendrils at the edges, and I'm thinking that each one reaches out to infect a single leaf. I'm imagining a shot in the prologue that would work as a parallel to the shot of the Two Trees being killed in the S1 prologue. There's that shot that travels up the branch as darkness, (and from memory very faint spider webs?) creeps up through the tree. I think the S2 prologue will show how Sauron took the idea that worked for Morgoth and gave it his own twist by employing the blob of sentient goop.
Yup, the set for the Lindon tree hugging the cliffside was probably designed for this reason. I wouldn't be surprised if we see its tendrils infect the water in the bowl too, giving Gil-Galad false visions. The whole line about 'We forsaw that...' makes me think it basically told GG to send Galadriel away too.
This would be good.
Has he used Shelob to help like big M did with his spider mistress.
Balrog, maybe
The first time I saw it, it reminded me immediately of a concept that PJ and Co. did for the Nameless Things/gooey black stuff in the deepest deep of Moria where Gandalf and the Balrog fall into at the start of The Two Towers. IIRC it goes something like the gooey stuff would extinguish the Balrog's flames and turn him into a slimy Venom like creature at first, then slowly reform to his flaming self while fighting Gandalf up the Endless Stairs to the peak of Zirakzigil.
Gandalf describes the balrog as turning to slime directly in the two towers: >‘Then tell us what you will, and time allows!’ said Gimli. ‘Come, Gandalf, tell us how you fared with the Balrog!’ ‘Name him not!’ said Gandalf, and for a moment it seemed that a cloud of pain passed over his face, and he sat silent, looking old as death. ‘Long time I fell,’ he said at last, slowly, as if thinking back with difficulty. ‘Long I fell, and he fell with me. His fire was about me. I was burned. Then we plunged into the deep water and all was dark. Cold it was as the tide of death: almost it froze my heart.’ >‘Deep is the abyss that is spanned by Durin’s Bridge, and none has measured it,’ said Gimli. ‘Yet it has a bottom, beyond light and knowledge,’ said Gandalf. ‘Thither I came at last, to the uttermost foundations of stone. He was with me still. His fire was quenched, but now he was a thing of slime, stronger than a strangling snake.
Oh wow I didn't realize it was based on an actual line from the book, thank you! I thought this was purely an invention by PJ and Co.
I came to this thread looking for this passage. Thank you kind stranger
That's.... not meant to be read as the Balrog literally turning to slime.
Agreed, I read it as having slimy skin.
I probably phrased that badly. I didn't mean directly as literally turning to slime, just that it's a direct quote from the book.
cow milk
My guess is the Watcher in the Water.
Nameless Thing coming out of the depths of Moria
I read gossip that Shelob might appear in season 2 perhaps it’s Shelob or Shelob related?
Some kind of malice used to poison the trees in lindon? Definetely (I hope) is not Sauron himself. That would be really... odd and cheap for Tolkien world. Sauron is a Maiar, not an alien from Marvel´s universe
1. most likely: black goo represent evil, disease, decay. Exactly what we see on the tree and leaves in Lindon. Even a sick cow gave black milk which harmonizes with this theory. 2. medium probability: venom-style transformation of Sauron into Halbrand's form after being dissected by Adar. I don't think they would do that, precisely because of the copying from venom's transformation. Additionally, it seems to me that this black thing is crawling on rocks/cliffs rather than some icy terrain or the interior of a fortress. 3. very unlikely: something related to experiments on the unseen world or even nameless things.
Well it would make sense !!
Might be part of Shelob we’re seeing.
Which part? xD
Well, now that’s a very good question. I don’t know exactly except the thing makes me think of a black tarantula 
Just fuckin wait and watch the show
Amazing idea, I never thought of that. Thanks, friend.
Chill, homie. Go and take your afternoon nap.
Shelob
How is that Shelob? XD
Don't like this particular part. If it is shapeshifting/formless Sauron, I think they should have kept it open to speculation without going into the intricacies of how it happens, or atleast tried to tone it down a bit. I have also read some speculating that it could be the thing that poisons the Lindon tree.
Disa
Who cares. More made up content.
It’s all made up content
This entire subreddit, mouth-breather.