Whoops. Seems I made a mistake in my post about episode 5. Celebrimbor is not going away after all. I got that all wrong. Apparently, he is making the 9 rings himself to somehow compensate for the 7 corrupted rings. Oh well. It seems making those 9 rings is a pain in the butt though, since every attempt has failed so far, even managing to run out of mithril. Celebrimbor is showing some reluctance to the whole thing still, and is slowly going a bit nuts in the process. The manipulation by Sauron continues unabated, and he even succeeds in getting more mithril somehow, despite being denied for more material by the dwarven king.
Civil war everywhere
Not much is explained. Did he steal the mithril, or was it not mithril at all? Maybe he tricked poor old crazy Celebrimbor to think it is, but in truth, it’s the corruption agent. Who knows? But if it is, it makes the whole trip over to the dwarves odd as hell. I’m not too invested either way. In the last episode, I said that they finally introduced some intrigue, yet now, it’s all gone again, and is returned to the classic Rings of Power mess it is.
The proto Uruk-hai orc leader (how now that works), or whatever he is, is staging a battle for Eregion to destroy Sauron – where all this with the rings is happening. However, it’s all a cunning plan by Sauron to eliminate two flies with one stone, you see. Spend elves and orcs lives, for then an easier take-over I presume. The tale is so messy, though. Especially when we don’t really know the powers of the rings created so far. Then we have Galadriel being odd as a captured elf. It almost felt like she was about to enter an alliance with her nemesis, the orcs. Also, the old “poor, peaceful orcs” stick will never ever land, regardless of how much they try.
The leader of the orcs, Adar, says he only wants peace and prosperity for his “children”. But he is going all the wrong ways to fulfill this, by terrorizing his neighbors and enslaving its people. Everything just feels so god-damn strange, and like I said, extremely messy. I also have to mention that he had Sauron in his possession at one point, when Sauron was disguised as Halbrand. Yet, in this episode, it turns out he knew it was Sauron all along. So why in the name of Tolkien did he let him go, for now to go after him and the elves in a huge war that will cost him everything?
Then we have civil war incident number two: the dwarves. Seeing as Turin’s father is still possessed by the ring, and keeps digging for valuables – The prince and his wife are taking things in their own hands, and staging an uprising in the mines, preventing any more mining. That’s all fine, but it feels so incredibly small. It’s only one puny tunnel, and about 20 dwarves involved in this, when it should cover a city of thousands. This is an issue throughout the show. Every event is tiny, when these happenings should be massive, since these events change Middle-Earth forever, for good and bad.
Spitter
And finally we have the Númenorian tale. This one ended as fast as it began. The captain refused to pledge loyalty to the new leader, so he must be sacrificed. However, at the last second, the queen steps up and demands to take this place. She walks into the sea to be taken by a giant Kraken. But the damn thing spit her out, and now everyone cheers for the queen again. That’s the power of not taking showers. Anyway, their old laws work like this. If the Kraken eats you, you are guilty. If it spits you out, you are innocent. Now this thing is resolved, I guess, which has made any kind of intrigue here totally meaningless so far. It could have just not happened at all, and we could instead have gone on with the plot.
Oh, and yes… not to forget. We have the not-hobbits and not-Gandalf, too. They do nothing at all. It’s like 20 minutes of people talking and delivering platitudes. This is also a consistent issue with the show that I have mentioned a few times now. People talk and talk, but say basically nothing to propel the story forward. Big yawn all around. Well, until next time. It seems we have a battle on our hands. I don’t think it will be good, since the fighting scenes have been lame so far.
Thanks for reading.
/Thomas
Tom's Gaming Vault 