Lord of the Rings from Boromir's perspective

what do the events of the Lord of the Rings look like from boromir's perspective let's take a look hi everyone this is Robert welcome to in deep geek on this channel we cover the best in fantasy and science fiction books and TV shows in nerdy detail the Lord of the Rings A Song of Ice and Fire The Witcher and more if that sounds good there's a subscribe button in the bottom right of your screen Boromir obviously doesn't survive all the way through the Lord of the Rings but his journey is nonetheless a fascinating one not least because so much of it actually happens off screen before we first meet him at Rivendell we are introduced to the action in The Lord of the Rings in the rural Backwater of the Shire yes we may hear rumors of dark Tidings coming from the south and east and eventually the Black Riders arrive but people still live Carefree lives not so in Gondor Gondor was set up from the start as a bulwark against Mordor all its attention and defenses were facing that way and now Sauron had returned there oradruin Mount Doom had come to life once more the forces of evil were being drawn there and Sauron was building a massive Army denethor Steward of Gondor saw all this and more through the palantir he kept hidden and had grown fearful of mordor's Might Living In Perpetual fear of the inevitable attack Boromir was denethor's oldest son his Heir and one of the most trusted commanders in his army he and his brother faramir were on the banks of the anduin river with a gondorian force in the ruins of the ancient city of osgiliath most of the Eastern side of the Great River had been overrun by sauron's forces years earlier but Gondor still held the city and the Great Bridge across it it was the most strategically important sight to hold if they wanted to keep Mordor at Bay an attack was coming but they didn't know when then one evening faramir boromir's brother had a vivid dream they didn't have much time to consider it because the next morning there was a sudden attack Orcs had a dream and the easterlings led by the witch King himself it was a route boromir's company managed to destroy the last bridge over the anduin and swim back but only four of them survived including Boromir and faramir destroying the bridge would earn them some time the anduin was a wide river and Crossing it with an army was a complex operation but the entire Eastern side of the river was now given over to sauron's forces holding the west side of the river must have felt like the overriding priority but faramir had that dream again several more times and then Boromir got the exact same one this was clearly not just a random dream but something prophetic this is how Boromir describes it later at the Council of elrond in that dream I thought the Eastern Sky grew dark and there was a growing Thunder but in the west a pale light lingered and out of it I Heard a Voice remote but clear crying seek for the sword that was broken in imladrus it dwells there shall be councils taken stronger than morgul spells there shall be shown a token that Doom is near at hand for isildur's Bane shall awaken and the halfling fourth shall stand it seemed important so the two brothers decided to take it to their father denethor now denethor doesn't come across particularly well in The Lord of the Rings films or in the book to be fair but Tolkien is clear that we meet him at the end of a long Decline and at heart he is a very wise and knowledgeable man he knew of imladrus Rivendell and told his sons of it at which point we come to a very telling moment for boromi's character faramir wants to go to follow this prophecy North his father denethor wouldn't want Boromir to abandon the defense of Gondor but sporomir takes the task on himself why well Boromir tells us simply that since the way was full of doubt and danger I took the journey upon myself he was protecting his little brother that's what he had been doing his whole life in fact after Boromir and faramir's mother died denethal retreated into himself and started hating on Vladimir whose birth he blamed for her death so Boromir stepped up caring for faramir as he grew he was five years older so throughout their childhood Boromir was always very much the mentor and protector figure for faramir anyway Boromir set off without really knowing where he was going the clear implication here is that denethor knew or suspected more than he was willing to tell Boromir out of paranoia about Aragorn and Gandalf the road lasted northwestwards through Rohan and the gap of Rohan but when Boromir turned North it kind of petered out there had once been a great north-south road that linked Gondor and the lost kingdom of Arno but that was now long gone near the abandoned town and Bridge of thabad he lost his horse trying to cross a dangerous Ford and continued on foot no doubt losing many of his Provisions at the same time it took him 110 days about three and a half months of hard travel every day before he finally found Rivendell and when he got there he discovered that others had also been drawn there Legolas from mirkwood to tell of gollum's Escape Gimli from Erebor to tell of Sauron making contact with them the hobbits from the Shire and Gandalf freshly escaped from saraman it can only have seemed like fate councils were taken as per his dream then Aragorn revealed the sword that was broken and Frodo the halflings stood forth with the One Ring Boromir had come all that way to seek an answer to the riddle of the dream but now he had it you can almost see his mind working he had spent his entire life under the Shadow of Mordor Sauron was sure to attack at any moment and the dream had brought him to a place where people could help save everything he knew and loved first he asks whether a lindel's sword could be reused to help in the fight it was a legendary ancient weapon and one that Sauron would fear Aragorn gave up perhaps to that then He suggests that the power of the One Ring could be used against Sauron and elrons said a flat no to that to his credit he doesn't press either point and his pride prevents him actually asking for help instead rather passively aggressively muttering so be it then in Gondor we must trust to such weapons as we have and at the least while the wise ones guard this ring we will fight on though I do not ask for Aid we need it it would comfort us to know that others fought also with all the means that they have Aragorn does eventually commit his sword to minister his defense and Boromir agrees to travel with the company for the time being if they are going to Mordor then they are traveling in the same way anyway which makes Boromir a bit of an exception in the fellowship he had never bought into the same Mission as the rest of them in truth he was just going home but had agreed to travel with them part of the way so from this perspective we can start to see why Boromir was a bit grumpy about it all his homeland was in grave danger and he had abandoned it for a round trip of what would be nearly a year for what the answer to a riddle and a vague commitment from a Ranger with a broken sword who didn't look anything like he imagined his illustrious ancestors to have done he could have been at home preparing gondor's defenses all this time then when they do set off he gets consistently overruled on which route to take Boromir wanted to go back the way he came albeit not Crossing near thabad again but Gandalf overruled that because he wanted to steer clear of Sarah man in Isengard they tried going through the red horn pass but the snowstorm pushed them back it was incidentally boromir's idea to bring firewood with them just in case and that saved them from freezing to death and then he and Aragorn literally carried the hobbits out to safety then Gandalf wanted to go through morya and Boromir said he would only go that way of everyone else voted against him which they did and when they got there Gandalf admits that he doesn't even know the password to get in in the book Boromir gets so frustrated with this that it is he not Pippin that throws the rock into the pool outside the gates and presumably wakes The Watcher in the water then on the other side of Moria Aragorn leads the party into lothlorian despite boromir's objections it's easy to see how Boromir a man used to giving orders and having them obeyed might start to think that he is just being ignored all the time everything he asks everything He suggests is just overruled he's being a full and useful member of the fellowship he fought as well as Eddie and Moria and saved their lives on the red horn pass but he isn't being given the respect he is used to and in lothlorian Galadriel tries to read his mind she does this with all of the fellowship but Boromir seems to be the only one who actively tries to block her and it's understandable to me it seemed exceedingly strange said Boromir maybe it was only a test and she thought to read our thoughts for her own good purpose but almost I should have said that she was tempting us and offering what she pretended to have the power to give it need not be said that I refuse to listen the men of ministereth are true to their word but what he thought that the lady had offered him Boromir did not tell this is a fascinating and I think overlooked moment and I will do a full video on it at some point but it's clear that from around this time Boromir started to fixate more and more on Frodo and the ring he pressed Frodo on what Galadriel had tempted him with and once they were in the boats pedaling down the anduin river he often stared at Frodo in a weird way one evening when they are camped up he tries once more to get someone anyone to agree to his idea that they should go to ministereth which is really close now rather than heading off to certain Doom in Mordor but no they are having none of it he will have to return to his father and admit that the whole mission amounted to nothing and the various Noble dwarves elves and humans he met all refused to come to gondor's age despite sauron's imminent attack so they come to the moment where they will have to part ways final decisions have to be made and it's clear that boromir's mind and heart is now starting to be taken over by the ring Frodo heads off to have a bit of quiet time to build up the courage to make the final decision to head east and Boromir follows him the passage that follows is really well written because you can see the Rings control over Boromir start ramping up over several Pages without ever being inside his point of view he starts calmly talking to Frodo then suggests once more that they go to ministereth because it's on the way questions the sanity of walking into Mordor and keeps increasing the pressure can he see the ring why can't they use it for good he gets up and starts pacing talking quicker and louder his language becomes sharper saying all the good things that he would do with the ring that it is only Frodo's by chance and could have been his it should have been his until finally the ring completely takes over and he lunges for Frodo we read that his face was hideously changed a raging fire in his eyes the Ring's power over him though passes even quicker than it came he trips the fog clears and he starts crying tears of Contrition it's a tragic moment and I don't think we can blame him for that moment the power of the Ring was intense and he genuinely did want to help save his people he had been a long way and would return empty-handed to what must have felt to him like certain defeat the Boromir we see after that seems defeated himself he returns to the rest of the fellowship eyes downcast and grief-filled after admitting that he argued with Frodo and Frodo disappeared Aragorn tasks him with protecting Mary and Pippin who obviously rush off to find their friend his death is not dwelt on in the book but it is every bit as heroic as Sean Bean dying on screen Aragorn finds him dying with many arrows in him surrounded by more than 20 dead Orcs killed by Boromir with his dying breath he admits what he did and basically says he got what he deserved and that he failed that must have been how he felt he had wanted to save his people and had failed to bring Aid he had fallen to the power of the ring and despite his best efforts he failed to protect Mary and Pippin and Aragorn forgives him no says Aragorn taking his hand and kissing his brow you have conquered few have gained such a victory be it peace ministereth shall not fall in his last moments all that he thought he had failed at he had actually conquered yes his actions had broken the fellowship but it was actually what Frodo needed to get the courage to carry on to Mordor yes he had fallen under the power of the ring but he had come through the other side and redeemed himself in defending the hobbits and yes he hadn't returned to ministereth with aid but Aragorn now promised that ministereth would not fall he would go there rather than follow Frodo Boromir failed but in his failure lay Redemption and the roots of the greatest victory of the third age if you'd like more videos diving deep into tolkien's legendarium then please click on the link on the left of your screen now or if you'd like to support this channel the best way to do that is by clicking on the patreon link on the right of your screen that's all for this time thanks for watching I'll see you again soon

Channel: In Deep Geek

Views: 139,837

Keywords: lord of the rings, the lord of the rings, lotr, fellowship of the ring, middle earth, tolkien, boromir death, boromirs last stand, gondor, minas tirith, in deep geek, idg, deep geek

Id: 8Oc4MPKovyU

Length: 14min 48sec (888 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 20 2023