The War of the Last Alliance: Season 5 - Part 1 | On Adapting a Second Age TV Show

what if that prologue from the first Lord of the Rings movie were adapted as the final season of a TV show 10 episodes to tell the tale of the war of the last Alliance well that pretty much is the only way that any second age TV show could feasibly end it's what every thread of every storyline so far should have been building to in seasons 1 and 2 of this series I talked about the tale of the great rings and the elves who forged them and their conflict with Sauron in Seasons three and four I talked about the tale of numenor and the Mortal men of that doomed Island and their conflict with Sauron and now finally we've come to season five where I will tell the tale of the alliance between elves and men and their con conflict with Sauron [Music] Maya Govan and melanin and welcome to the first half of season five in my adapting the second Age series or how the rings of power could have been written if you've not seen the previous videos about seasons one to four I would recommend checking them out this video will be better if you're familiar with the story so far and that's because season 5 of this alternate universe Rings a power TV show is all about the culmination of the entire second age that's come before this season is the hinge connecting seasons one through four to the stories of the third age and specifically the Lord of the Rings right at the end of the third age but just before I begin let me say this video has pretty much nothing to do with like the actual rings of power TV show I'm not reviewing that show I'm not critiquing it I'm not really even talking about it at all this is simply a continuation and conclusion of a series that I began thinking about months before the first episode of the actual show aired this is what the finale of a second age TV show might have looked like if the engine of adaptation and the momentum of the story were drawn out of tolkien's writings as opposed to kind of being manufactured in a writer's room and then projected onto those writings and before I get into the specifics of the story I'll give my obligatory spiel about what we should and should not have the rights to obviously in a perfect world a writer would be able to use everything Tolkien wrote in their Tolkien adaptation but we don't live in a perfect world and to be honest it's very easy to say that a second age TV show should just follow tolkien's writings to the letter but if there's like legal reasons why that can't be the case then it's not a particularly constructive statement for me to make so for the sake of being a little bit more creative then critical I will to an extent play by the same rules as the showrunners in regards to rights sort of this is not a high budget Middle Earth adaptation it's a YouTube video so I'm not going to shoot it in the foot by trying too hard to ignore the cinema really on and the unfinished tales and there will be some moments where I do talk about non-lord of the Rings writings because I just can't help myself but my point is that whilst I've been making this series I have been pretty Blown Away by how many second age details there are to be found in The Lord of the Rings in its appendices it is still a little bit ludicrous to try adapting a second age show with just the Lord of the Rings and its appendices considering that 95 of those writings are about the third age but the Lord of the Rings is just so rich and there's so much to it in the way of themes and the things that Tolkien explores are so mythological and kind of universal that apart from some specific names that yeah we don't have the rights to use a vast amount of what's actually necessary to tell this story is available to be drawn out of The Lord of the Rings and although that's been true for every season of this hypothetical show so when it comes to the final part of this story season five even more so so there's not really any excuse for an Unfaithful adaptation this is the thing that the whole second age has been building too it's the thing that will lay the foundations for the third age the point of everything the war of the last Alliance so just like with seasons one and three I think season five should begin with a cold opening one Standalone scene to establish the Crux of the story that's being told before even the opening credits roll in seasons one and three I opened with a scene of dialogue between two characters who are on the one hand very different from each other yet also both cut from the exact same cloth in that scene it was the super old Mortal king of numenor elloros or taraminiator talking with his super youthful Immortal twin brother Ella Ronde and in this scene we'll see a kind of thematic prequel to that as we fade in on the first shot of the final season we see absolute destruction a land devastated by War but beyond anything that's actually possible in the real world this isn't the aftermath of a battle it's more like how I imagine the Earth would have looked after the asteroid that killed off the dinosaurs utter apocalypse there is no landscape Beyond gaping chasms in the broken Earth the sky is black with smoke the ground is black with Ash there's not even any debris no evidence of any life ever being here only the immeasurable scars of earth-shattering ruin but among the biblical wreck of this cataclysm we see a figure walking alone figure looks out of place despite all the damage around him this guy looks perfect Angelic beautiful wise beyond measure and there is light in his eyes in fact he doesn't look too dissimilar to how Sauron the Lord of gifts looked back in season one but this is not Sauron this is a different Maya a Herald of the uttermost West Sauron as he could have been and as this Angelic being of light and goodness walks among the astonishing devastation he encounters someone else a guy who is basically his opposite broken humbled defeated a cloaked figure who looks about as damaged as the lands he's wandering as the Angelic being of light approaches we see words appear on the screen the end of the first age and then their dialogue begins I really think less is more here but the full line of what's being discussed should be a conversation about Redemption and repentance The Herald of the uttermost west shows Mercy to the pitiful figure before him he tells him softly that it's over now he can be free of the past free of the first age he can be Sauron no longer the cloaked figure looks up and we see that it is indeed Sauron but unlike any version of Sauron that we've seen before at the end of the first age he has beaten vanquished and subdued then the herald of the West offers Sauron a second chance come West with me kneel before the Valar and repent forswear the evil you have done and the powers of the West will forgive you all you need to do is beg their pardon the camera lingers on Sauron and the making or breaking of the scene will be dictated entirely by the acting of whoever is cast to play this character perhaps the most important character in the whole show if the acting is on point then we can convey a huge amount of sauron's characterization without any need for Words there is a part of him that wants this forgiveness to be free of moragoth to join his people in the uttermost west at the moment he's ashamed he's afraid and he is tempted to be soured on no longer but he just can't do it he can't allow himself to be humbled to face consequences to be at the mercy of another in this moment in the final moments of the first age we see Sauron make his most fateful decision he will not be for pardon he will never kneel again not sincerely he looks West but he recognizes No Authority save his own then he turns and looks East towards All That Remains of Middle Earth and then he walks away if you've read the cinema really on then you'll know that this Herald of the uttermost West is inspired by a onway we don't have the rights to that name we don't need them this isn't a scene about name-dropping from the law this is the most important scene in establishing sauron's character he is one of the only characters to feature in every single season of this show but now that we've seen a glimpse of where he came from before the second age hopefully it will we contextualize a lot of what we've seen previously before the second age began Sauron had one foot Upon A Road to Redemption there was a part of him that genuinely wanted to take it but he chose to turn aside sauron's Pride set him on a different path and where that different path will take him in the end is what season five is all about so as Sauron walks East into a red sunrise and disappears among the destruction the music begins to swell and beneath it we should hear the Rising sound of Rushing Water a as an allusion to the flooding of valerian but b as a way to transition to our next scene which begins with a sweeping shot of a thunderous Great River the anduin another very important part of season five and I think the most striking thing about this second scene should be its astounding contrast to the previous one instead of apocalyptic Devastation what we're seeing now is an immense River passing through green and fertile lands on the West Bank of the river stand great forests and on the East Bank vibrant Gardens the camera follows the river sweeping South and as the music reaches its Crescendo we look down upon the great City that straddles the Great River a city so awe-inspiring that it looks like something that could have been built in new manual it is a city of two halves bisected by the river but joined by a great stone bridge and at the Heart of the City stands the massive Dome of stars this is Australia at the beginning of its days capital of the very newly established Kingdom of Gondor but the camera should not linger here first it should sweep West and bring us to another or inspiring White City that rises out of a Green Country this is Minas a Nord the Tower of the Sun the seven-leveled city that will one day be called Minas tirith but the camera doesn't linger here either instead it sweeps back east past oscariot to a third City fair and silver against the dark mountains this is Minas ethyl the Tower of the Moon the glowing city of light that will one day be corrupted and turned into Minas moragul finally the camera brings us back to where it started the majesty and Splendor of Australia the city of two halves the capital between these two towers we enter into that Dome of stars and find Two Thrones set beside each other on the western Throne sits the lord of the Tower of the sun the sun of the Sun a nadion and on the Eastern Throne sits his elder brother the servant of the Moon isildur gondor's first two kings as we zoom in on their faces we should see words appear once again on the screen the end of the second age we don't need to State it explicitly but there always has to be an answer to the question what year is this set in and I have chosen to begin season five in the year 34 29 of the second age that's 110 years after the end of season 4 which means the kingdom of Gondor is 109 years old in this moment and the second age only has 12 years left so after those first two scenes we should probably have like the opening credits or whatever and then we will get into the meat of the first few episodes and unlike previous Seasons season 5 will actually have quite a few different storylines all going on at the same time this season is a coming together of all previous Seasons so there will be a lot of moving Parts but focus is still key so I think we should begin with a particular emphasis on the characters in Gondor and specifically we should focus on the guy who kind of is the main character of season five isildur if we follow tolkien's timeline then by this year 34-29 isildura should be 220 years old he's a numenorian so he's not going to look much older than about 40 but isildura is no longer the young Lord Ling that we met at the beginning of season three now he is a great king of a great Kingdom and he's also a father at this time isildur has three adult sons his eldest Ellen door who we met towards the end of last season and Ellen doula's two slightly younger brothers ardatan and kirion right in the first episode I think both isildur and anadian should get the ball rolling by committing themselves to one of the main things that season 5 is fundamentally about building alliances should leave Minas ethyl in the care of his wife ayarden I'll come back to her in a few minutes and he should take his three sons isil doors as and they should all ride West a long way through the outlands of Gondor across the river ringlow and up into the White Mountains which fun fact is basically the reverse journey of what isil does air Aragorn will make on his way to the Battle of pelenor fields in just over 3000 years time anyway if you know the story you'll know where I'm going with this because it is in the foothills of these White Mountains that Tolkien tells us isildur set the great black stone of Eric a very mysterious artifact of numenor that will stand upon the hill of Eric all the way down to the days of Aragon and Beyond and the reason that the stone of Eric matters is because this is where the pre-numenorian middlemen of the mountains swore their fateful oath to fight alongside isildur when the time came as we know this oath will go on to be broken and these men of the mountains who swore it will go on to be the oath Breakers obviously these guys will be a very important part of The Lord of the Rings but the beginning of their story is Right Here and Now with isildur and quite importantly I think his heirs in the last few years of the second age so these men of the White Mountains everything we know about them comes from The Lord of the Rings which means we have no worries regarding rights and I think the most important thing for us to establish in the first episode is that these men of the mountains are nothing like isildur and his numenoreans these guys are Middle Men of Middle Earth after the fall of eregi on back in season two Sauron took control of much of Southern Middle Earth and ruled over it for more than a millennium known as the dark years back in season three the ancestors of these men of the mountains would have worshiped Sauron but in season 4 Sauron was brought to numenor and the dark years in Middle Earth slowly came to an end at the end of season 4 numenor was destroyed sauron's body and a great deal of his power were destroyed also but his ruling ring was not what sauron's currently up to a hundred years later is still very much unknown but both isildur and anadion are far too wise to believe that he was destroyed completely their Kingdom of Gondor stands upon the doorstep of morador hence the need for alliances and something that's very cool about season five in previous Seasons I made a big deal about language and how The sindhuin-speaking Elves and the Dunedin would not have a common tongue with the native men of Middle Earth but now that we are a hundred years into the history of Gondor that's no longer the case there is no more need for subtitles during the span of the century since season 4 westron has slowly evolved into the common tongue throughout the Westlands a common language spoken by the men of the mountains and the men of Gondor it is a creole language formed by the coming together of numenorian adonayak and the languages of the middlemen with a soft trace of Elvish influence favored by the faithful Dunedin and as is the case in Lord of the Rings westron can be translated straight into English or whichever language you're watching it in by season five all of our heroes have a Common Language anyway isildura and his three heirs should ride up to the hill of Eric and before the stone of Eric they have a meeting with these Middle Men of the mountains and specifically with their King the Mortal man who will in 3000 Years be known as the king of the Dead and as well as setting up you know plot stuff this scene should also reveal how the dunadine the Exiles of numenor interact with the kind of indigenous people of what is now Gondor as I say only a century and a half ago the ancestors of these men worshiped Sauron but since the arrival of the Dunedin they're free of him right at least that's how it would appear so the relationship between these two kings isildur and the not yet King of the Dead is worth spending a bit of time on it's important to see why the men of the mountains would swear that oath of loyalty to Gondor and to explore the context of their eventual oath breaking I imagine isildur and his sons coming to the stone of Eric on a relatively regular basis bringing gifts to their neighbors in the mountains and I think the most significant gift that the dunadine would bring to the middle men should be the gift of arthalas King's foil in Lord of the Rings we are told that arthalas was brought to Middle Earth by the men of numenor and it only grew in places where the dunadine went this is a uniquely numenorian gift and the healing properties of this plant would be of great benefit to the men of the mountains along with food and gold and probably weapons the king of the mountains takes these gifts from isildur but they are not given freely isildur reminds these men that Sauron is gone but not for good if morador should ever Rise Again The Dark Lord's attack will fall first upon Gondor and specifically upon Minas ethyl that's why isildura built his City on sauron's doorstep all of Middle Earth is under his protection and if the moment comes isildur swears that he will fight against the dark lord the dunadine will fight against the Dark Lord gondord will fight against the dark lord and the men of the mountains will fight alongside them that is the deal the future king of the Dead accepts these terms but isildura is unconvinced that these men have abandoned Sauron worship entirely he tells them to renew their oath swear it upon the stone of Eric swear an oath by the name of illuvatar when isildura calls them they will fight perhaps the king could be somewhat reluctant I guess he'd have no great love for the dunadine but he does love their gold and their weapons and their atholas so he faces the stone and under the witness of hisilders as he swears that should the need arise he and his people of the mountains will fight for Gondor against the armies of Sauron so that's kind of what isil Doda is doing in episode 1 but whilst that's happening I think we should have a similar scene but in a different part of Gondor with isildur's brother anadion as a seal door Goes West with his sons up into the White Mountains a nadion should take his son and go south following the newly built harad Road into an area known as hard on door throughout Seasons three and four a nadion hasn't had an awful lot to do outside of being isildura's very Valiant younger brother but in season 5 and nadion will have to stand on his own two feet he's now 210 years old he is a king in his own right with a son who is going to go on to be very important actually Tolkien tells us that anadion had four children but apart from the important one the others are never named or talked about and honestly we don't even know what their genders were so because we have so many cool things to focus on in the season I will kind of sweep those other three under the rug but the fourth child the last baby ever to be born on the island of numenor his name is menel deal and spoiler alert it is through mental deal that all future kings of Gondor will be descended so a nadion and mental deal follow the Great harad Road into the warm southerly region of hard on door and hard on door is a land that over the course of the third age will go back and forth quite a few times between Gondor and independent and by the time of The Lord of the Rings it's actually deserted but right now in the beginning the wars of the gondorians and the Hara dream haven't happened yet and so I imagine heart on door in the second age would be a land where different people live together and different cultures mix some men of harandor would be of Dunedin descent whose ancestors came from Umba or palargir or somewhere else others would be pre-numenoreans who journeyed south from the outlands of Gondor and some would be haradrim who journeyed up from farharad all these cultures are now connected by anadian's new Harare Road and I feel like this is a cool opportunity to explore a very interesting part of Middle Earth that doesn't often get explored however all is not wonderful in hot on door and a part of the reason why King and nadion of Gondor has made this journey is to uncover rumors of a shadow that is growing on his Southern border at a great Crossroads a nadian menel deal and their company Halt and they await the coming of another Royal company up from the south a king among the harroduim flying a banner of a red hawk and this king among the haradrim should be a great grandson from that haraduim family that I briefly mentioned back in season four the main point of that plot line was simply to establish divisions among the Harry dream and to show how a single extended family can be utterly sundered by hatred the harrodream of the Red Hawk understand that Sauron is the true enemy of all men and they Ally themselves against him but there are others in harad who so resented the atrocities of the black numenoreans that they would rather join with the dark lord than make peace with the dunadine these dark-willed Harry dream fly the banner of the black serpent however the king who comes to meet a nadion at the crossroads he is a great grandson of the wiser branch of that family he is the king of the Red Hawk he doesn't love the men of numenora but he does recognize that they are not the enemy many of his people believe them to be and even if they were Sauron is still the true enemy many of the haradrim disagree but the king makes an alliance with anarian anyway and he swears to fight with Gondor should the dark lord return for he is the enemy of all men now I'll come back to this horror dream storyline in a little bit but let's stick with the dunadine for just a little longer and take a look at what's going on with the seal dura's wife ayardian I guess the most relevant thing to say about Aryan right now is that in the year this is taking place 34-29 isildur's wife would have been pregnant with their final child and this pregnancy is important I've already mentioned the Elder three sons elendur aratan and carry on but spoiler I guess none of them are destined to have children of their own instead all of isildur's ads in the third age will be descendants of this as yet unborn child that ayarden is currently carrying anyway while ayardian's husband and her adult sons are off in the White Mountains she remains in Minas ethyl and Minas ethyl is a very important location for us to spend some time in I'm aware that Minas and Noor AKA Minas tirith is probably the more iconic City but I definitely do think we need to explore just how amazing Minas ethyl is and just so happens Minas ethyl is described in great detail in The Lord of the Rings so again in terms of Rights we have everything we need to follow tolkien's lead and what I find so cool about Minas ithil is its association with the moon and with night time while the moon is out the city's gleaming marble captures some of its silver light so that the streets and houses of Minas ethyl glow white in the night and in this Central Courtyard of this radiant City blossoms the first White Tree of Gondor the tree That Grew From the fruit of nimloth which is seildura saved from Sauron back in season four and yet this glowing Tower of the moon is built into the mountains of Shadow this is the same place where isildur encountered those Sauron worshiping cultists back in season three he built Minas ethyl here for the express purpose of guarding the pass of the spider and keeping watch over the lands of the seemingly vanquished enemy Minas ethyl exists because isildura carries with him the knowledge of The Naz ghoul and he knows that despite new menorah's downfall Sauron is not gone for good also one more very important thing about Minas ethyl just like oskeliath and Minas Anor isildur city is home to one of the seven palantiri the seven-seeing stones of the dunadine anadion has one in Minas anur there is a massive one in Australia there's one in the numenorian Outpost of orthank which will in thousands of years time become sarumans and there are three up north in ardenor the other great Kingdom of the dunadine that is ruled by the now 310 year old high king of all the Dunedin Ln deal so as a Aryan looks into the palantir of miras ethyl we can transition the story over a thousand miles north to the palantir of her father-in-law up in his capital city in his kingdom of ardenur now arnor is another really really cool part of tolkien's writings it's sort of like the northern equivalent of Gondor but throughout the third age I feel it is quite often overshadowed by its more iconic sister Kingdom in the South however back at the end of the second age the complete opposite would have been true like Gondor is cool but it's no Arden or at this moment in time adonur is by far the greatest Kingdom of men anywhere in the world upon the shores of Lake nenuial stands arno's Capital City on numinous and it is from here that Ellen Deal rules with his Queen soroniel and another fun fact over 3 000 years ago back at the beginning of the second age back in season one Lake nenuial was one of the key locations where Galadriel and her wandering company dwelt this Lake used to be governed by Galadriel which is particularly interesting because remember Galadriel also dwelt in belas during the second age down in what's now Southern Gondor thousands of years before the downfall of numenor Galadriel was tending to the lands that would one day become both adenor and Gondor we don't really have the rights to make a big deal out of that but it's interesting and it ties Galadriel tighter into the Dune down storyline also speaking of Galadriel and the dunadine there is another super awesome detail that we totally do have the right to use and that is the ring of bada here which sits upon Ln Deal's finger so Ellen deal inherited this ring along with his first age sword narcile and his silver scepter of undulier from his very distant ancestor silamarian first-born child of the firstborn great grandson of elleros numenor's first king as we know from season 3's prologue seal Marian did not succeed her father the king because back then only a male Heir could rule numenor so the ruling scepter of the king passed to Sila Marian's younger brother butziel Marion inherited a silver scepter which was passed down through her descendants all the way to Ellen deal the ruling scepter of pneumonol's Kings was lost with our farizon in the caves of the Forgotten at the end of last season but the silver scepter of silmarian that was brought to Middle Earth where it has now become the ruling scepter of the kings of arenor it is the very same scepter that Ellen deals eventual Heir Aragorn will take up when he unites the kingdoms of adonur and Gondor once again at the end of the third age now what does that have to do with the Ring of barah here well this ring was also an heirloom of silamarines that ended up in Ellen Deal's possession but the story that this ring represents is such a fundamentally important theme that it basically defines Ellen Deal's characterization throughout season five so the Ring of butter here is old like older than any other named ring way older than the rings of power it's older than the Sun and originally it belonged to galadriel's wonderful older brother finrod fellagund but then finrod gave this ring to a mortal man called barahir and he did so because this ring represented an oath it was a token of abiding friendship between finrod and the line of barahir in The Lord of the Rings appendices we are told very little about finrod fellagund except venrod feligund friend of men who gave his life to save Baron son of badah here the whole point of finrod's character in The appendices the only thing that we have the rights to is the profundity of the friendship that existed between the Best Of The Elves and the best of men thousands and thousands and thousands of years ago back in the first age being Wilder did not die hunting Seldon Vengeance for finrod is not the point of his relationship with Galadriel thenroad was a capitalized friend of men that's his epithet that's how he's remembered to history he gave his life to save the life of a man and that man Baron son of badah here went on to have two twin grandsons called elarond and Ella Ross in that original cold opening of season one where we see Ella Ross and elerond exploring the themes of death and deathlessness ELO Ross should give the Ring of barahir back to the race of elves via his brother elderon on his deathbed but elderon should immediately re-gift it to ellerosa's first born child the whole point of this ring is that it is a gift from elves to men and it represents thousands of years of friendship between Eldar and edine and friendship between Eldar and edine is exactly what Ellen deal is all about in season five so in the first few episodes I think Ellen dealer should ride away from our numinous and he should follow the newly built Road Southwest from his Capital City to the Great White Tower of elosterion which stands near the border between ardenur and Lindon a kingdom of men and a kingdom of elves in fact we are told in The Lord of the Rings prologue that these White Towers were built specifically for High King Ellen deal by his friend and neighbor hi King gilligalad they are another opportunity to show the profundity of the friendship between these two kingdoms elendiel climbs the eleven Tower of elosterion and at the very top he finds Gili Gallard waiting for him there's nothing hugely important to the plot here but I don't think it's enough just to tell the viewer that these guys are friends we really need to witness first hand the relationship that has grown between these two High Kings in the 109 years since they met in the final scene of season four on the one hand what we have here is a meeting between the two greatest Kings of their respective races but it's also a coming together of genuine friends an exploration of what is up there among the most significant friendships ever in the entire history of Middle Earth and just to explore this theme even further and we introduce another very important character the thing that this Tower of elosterion is most famous for is that it's home to the most special of all seven palantiri in Middle Earth whereas the other six are all connected to each other the stone of elosterion is entirely separate it it cannot be used to communicate with the other six instead it had been aligned by kieradon the shipwright to look West all the way west Beyond even the straight road that now Saunders the uttermost west from the world itself when Ellen deal stands on the Eastern side of this palantir and he looks directly into it he sees the undying lands he is among the only Mortals ever to witness it and even among the elves of Middle Earth elosterion is an almost sacred place of pilgrimage due to a coming together of Gili gallard's Tower Ellen deals palantir and keridan's almost Divine connection to the lands west of West something truly wondrous has been achieved a window into the undying lands also speaking of kierdadan perhaps the most important thing about his character right now is that he is one of the three guardians of an Elvish ring of power around his neck kirodadan keeps Nadia the ring of fire and we are told by Tolkien that when Sauron first placed the ruling ring upon his finger almost 2 000 years before the scene the bearers of the three were immediately aware of him so I think we could introduce the primary conflict of season five by having kieradon perceive that evil is rising again in the South the dark lord who's been conspicuously absent for the century following numenorous downfall is making Ready for War once more the ruling ring has been used in mortador kierdan can feel it he doesn't know the specifics and he's way too wise to try and use his ring to learn more but war is coming and whatever happens next this war will bring an end to the second age that's why Gili Gallard summoned Ellen deal to elosterion and to the surprise of absolutely no one Ellen dealer should immediately declare his intention to unite his dunadine with the null door when the time for war arrives zero hesitation the last Alliance begins in this Tower at this moment with these High Kings Ellen deal and Gili Gallard come what may they will take on Sauron together anyway there are two more Elven ring bearers to talk about so I will swiftly move on but just before I leave ardenor there's one more interesting detail that I think we could briefly explore with our invented character Queen soroniel we are told by Tolkien that a significant number of the men in adenor weren't actually Exiles of numenor many of them were simply descendants of the middlemen who lived in this part of Middle Earth for Millennia before the downfall of numenor distant descendants of the men we met back in seasons one and two also ancestors of the men who will go on to call themselves the men of Brie these guys aren't Dunedin but they are accepted into the kingdom of Arnold and they do become subjects under the protection of Ellen deal and soronial so perhaps we can show a few scenes depicting queen soroniel of numenor reinforcing and strengthening the bonds between the dunadine of arenor and the middlemen of arnor she is uniting cultures breaking down divisions and working to ensure that arnor is a and for all the men who call it home perhaps she is the reason why all the men of this land will fight with the Ln deal in the last Alliance despite the fact that some of their ancestors did once worship Sauron but I don't have time to make up specifics and saraniel's a character I invented so let's Journey a few hundred miles east of our numenas and take a look at what's happening over in Rivendell with our massively important half elephant ring bearer elarond in the background of Seasons three and four I talked about a storyline featuring The re-establishment of an alliance between the elves of the Northwest and the dwarves of duren's folk back in seasons one and two there was an amazingly prosperous alliance between kellebrimboard of eregion and during the third of kazad Doom but then Sauron made War upon the elves and both calabrimbor and doom in the third were killed the doors of durin were shut and the dwarves of kazard Doom sealed themselves away in their Mansions beneath the mountains but that was almost 2 000 years ago in season 3 Gili Gallard entered kazad doom and became the first Outsider to meet with their new king during the fourth and in season 4 it was elerond of rivendale who began reforging the friendship that calabrina Board of a region once had with during the Third so we should reintroduce elrond and during the fourth in season five and show a glimpse of what they have spent a hundred years doing since we last saw them I am imagining a very formal important meeting perhaps in rivendell's Hall of fire between elavond and King Duran IV and we need to make it very clear that during the fourth just like his ancestor during the third is not just some dwarf according to the customs of his people this guy is doing the deathless reborn he is sort of a Reincarnation of the original dwarf a mythological figure the first of his kind ever to awaken who was fashioned from the Earth by allay himself the maker it is prophesied that over the span of all Dwarven history there shall be only seven durians and after the last one dies the race of dwarves will disappear from the world so my point is this during the fourth is an incredibly big deal and just like elderon he is the bearer of a ring of power one of the seven however unlike elrond during the fourth wears his ring upon his finger he claims that sauron's malice has no effect on him and to be fair it would at least appear that way he is an astoundingly wealthy and powerful super dwarf the greatest of his kind to be born in 2 000 years and he is the king of kazad doom in its prime as ring bearers both during the fourth and elrond would probably have perceived the same growing darkness that kieradon picked upon and so they are also both thinking that the dark Lords return is imminent if there were ever a time where an alliance between elves and dwarves would be crucial it's now but kazad Doom has spent almost 2 000 years with its doors shut only in the past 100 years has any dwarf of kazad Doom had any contact with someone who wasn't one of their own and although From elrond's perspective the alliance of calabrimbor and during the third was something that he remembers well from a dwarvish perspective those days of shared Prosperity between elves and men are now ancient history and what's best remembered of that history in kazard Doom is that the Beloved king during the third was slain in a war which the elves brought to his doorstep once again we are fundamentally exploring the difference between Mortal and Immortal perspectives death and deathlessness anyway although I imagine that elrond and during the fourth would have a lot of mutual respect for one another I can't imagine that their friendship would be a particularly easy one it gets so formal it's so big picture but in the next Rivendell scene I think we need to see something far more personal and much more character driven so in The Gardens of imladwis beneath a full moon elerond comes to hang out with his new best friend a youngish dwarf who I have invented for the story and decided to name flowy after a dwarf that Gandalf briefly mentions in the book of mazarbul and the reason that I want to include this flowy character is mainly for the sake of not just retreading the same storylines from season one and two we already spend plenty of time exploring the idea of a chosen dwarf you know during the deathless reborn that was the whole point of doing the third's character and so in season five I would like to introduce a different perspective on that same thing a story of during but from the point of view of the dwarf who wasn't chosen because surely right for every new durian born among the dwarves there must also be a son of durin who isn't the chosen one a prince who lives in the shadow of their mythologically profound father knowing that whatever they do they will never be durin this is what I'm imagining for Prince flowy son of during the fourth there's absolutely nothing wrong with him I'm not suggesting that he should be incompetent or anything like that it's just that compared to his super dwarf father flowy is a not quite so special Prince and the reason I'm saying all this is because I think there's potential for something really lovely here because for a guy like flowy there really is no one in all of Middle Earth who could understand what it might be like to have your father be the most mythologically significant figure among your entire race of people who else could know how that feels well elrond son of Ayo rendiel son of the guy who turned into a star and brought the first age to an end in so doing becoming one of the most celebrated figures within all Elvish Traditions I imagine flowy and elerond having this very specific thing in common and really bonding on a genuine personal level because of it and if flowy is a little bit atypical among other dwarves if he has a slightly more Elvish perspective and a desire to learn about the world beyond the confines of kazad Doom then we can develop a really rich relationship between these characters flowey has spent decades living as elwon's guest in imladres and in that time he has learned a lot of the way of elves and simultaneously taught elderon much dwarvish law from kazad Doom I've always found it fascinating how in The Hobbit elerond has a deeper knowledge of dwarvish moon letters than either Thorin or Gandalf and it is alarond who discovers the secrets of thrall's map perhaps we can imagine that it was during this invented friendship with flowey that elrond learned so much about the customs of duren's folk that we will see him Showcase in 3 000 years time in season 5 we see two sides to elderon's character on the one hand he is the Lord of imladuis bearer of Villia the Ring of air he is Gili gallard's Vice Regent in charge of reforging an alliance with king during the fourth but on the other hand he's just a wise kind delightful friend to his buddy flowy his relationship with during the fourth is what's driving the plot forward but it's his friendship with Prince flowy that at the heart of his character anyway I will of course come back to the storyline when things get going but before I do there's still one more ring bearer to introduce so let's hop over to the other side of the Misty Mountains and take a look at where Galadriel kelleborn and calebion are hanging out in the beginning of season five however first thing to say about Galadriel in season 5 is that Tolkien never mentioned her in his admittedly very limited writings concerning the war of the last Alliance so everything garlic to heal does in this season is going to have to be invented which means as always I'm going to try and ensure that these inventions are drawn out of tolkien's writings instead are projected onto them as I mentioned in the season 1 video galatriel's character Arc throughout the second age should be all about her growth into that other world deadly power that we all know and love from The Lord of the Rings in the first age there was melian the Maya Divine queen of a magically guarded Woodland realm in the third age melian's pupil Galadriel basically becomes melian II seasons one two and five of the show need to tell the story of how that happens in seasons 1 and 2 galadviel was all about trying to navigate balance between her wisdom and her Pride through the war with Sauron and the forging of the Rings she was tested and as a result her Ambitions changed from ruling her own great realm as an all-powerful queen of light to being a guardian over people less powerful than herself and protecting her ring of power before she departed to the North she was given a box of Malon seeds and she was tasked with finding a place in Middle Earth where they might one day grow it is her Destiny to take a small part of Middle Earth and turn it into something that captures the Splendor of the Elder days and the uttermost West the last time we saw Galadriel in season four she was dwelling in the land that are now part of Gondor but the Malon seeds remained unplanted almost as if galadwiel knew that one day she would yield these Southern lands to The Heirs of numenor but season 4 was 109 years ago and now in season 5 we see the final chapter of galadriel's second age story so we should begin with her in a golden wood all around her is a Grove of young melon trees and around her neck is a ring of power million is a plural of Mallon by the way Galadriel loves these young trees and she tends to each one of them with great care however this Grove of gold and silver is not yet quite lothlorian it's in the place that will one day become Karas galadon the city of galadviel and calebon in the third age this will be the heart of lothlorien but right now it's just a Grove of young melian trees deep inside a golden wood and it is where Galadriel and kelleborn have chosen to settle but I do need to point out that this part of Middle Earth should look really quite a bit different from how it looks on third age Maps during the third ages 3 000 years much of rovanion's great forests were felled by the local woodsmen but back in the day fungon and lothlorian were probably the same Forest Greenwood the great was considerably larger and potentially all these Woods were connected Northeastern Middle Earth used to be one huge forest and in addition to Galadriel and kelleborn this massive second age Woodland is home to a few other really cool characters in season 1 I mentioned three princes of the cindar who had all once been Kinsmen of the first age High King of the sindar synagogue of Doria the eldest and wisest of these three cindering princes is Keller born husband of Galadriel the youngest of these princes is thrond wheel future father of Legolas and the middle Prince is a character that I've invented and called Gana Thorne the reason Gala Thorne exists is simply because we don't have the rights to the names or Affair or ahmadir or malgalad but we can still explore a very similar story to the one told in unfinished tales with all the same emotional beats we'll just have to do it with this Gala thornan guy instead a king among the cindar and what Gala thornan and thrandwheel have been doing during the 1600 years since season two is basically going native when we first met them they were cindar princes living in a noldering kingdom Now They are Kings in their own right but Kings of the Woodland cindering rulers of a Sylvan population they've turned into pretty quintessential wood elves both Gala Thornton and thrandwheel readily adopted the practices and the customs of their Sylvan Gala dream subjects and by season 5 they embody much more of a woodland Vibe than kelleborn's silvery Cinder Starlight Vibe as I say they've gone native and we don't need to spend too much time here they are not the most important characters of season five but they do have a role in this story and I think the most efficient way to introduce that is to show us where the Woodland kingdoms of galathorn and thrandwheel come together in The Hobbit we learned that thrandwheel rules merkwood from his Halls way up in the north but back in the second age the capital of the Greenwood was actually right in the South thrandwheel's Capital is here the same stronghold that will in the third age be conquered and corrupted in two dollar guladur Kingdom on the other hand lies just to the west of thrandwheel's capital and the boundary between the two Woodland kingdoms the thing that separates thrandwheel's realm from garathorns is the river anduin however I'm imagining that at this time in history there would be a great Woodland Bridge across the anduin right at the point where these two Elvish Realms meet it is another invention tolki never mentioned such a bridge but I'm kind of picturing you know like a fantasy version of one of those living tree Bridges that's grown instead of built and there's a few reasons that I mention it again I'll come back to it a little bit later but right now it's a visual representation of how connected the Woodland elves in the second age are and how different that is from the isolationist godadrim that we meet in the third age and it also provides a convenient location for galadwiel and kelleborn to meet with their former followers turned Kings Gala Thorne and thrandwheel just like her fellow ring bearers kieridan and elerond galadual has also perceived that a shadow is stirring once again in morador this Century of peace is coming to an end and if the elves of the East do not unite they will fall to the power of Sauron but galadoran shouldn't take galadriel's warning particularly seriously the characters that he's inspired by did not have a particularly positive relationship with the null door and they have a rather unhealthy relationship with pride Gala Thornton has spent Millennia growing into a mighty Woodland King he comes across as a very powerful figure with an Elvish Kingdom at his beckoned call and galatviel doesn't she is not a queen kelleborn is not a king they have no realm aside from their Grove of Mallon trees within Gala Thorne's golden wood and yet when galadwiel speaks to galathorn and thrandwheel there can be no doubt which one of them holds the more profound type of power Gullah Thorne and thronddwell have armies but galadwiel is well on her way to becoming the next meleon her ambition has now given way to wisdom she wields magic that they cannot conceive of and although there are loads of powerful elves in Middle Earth there is only one Galadriel however during the scene galadwiel's daughter calebrian is conspicuously absent she and the rest of her parents wandering company chose not to settle among galadriel's Grove of Mallon trees and instead they are dwelling just to the south of the Greenwood in a place where the forest has given way to Gardens a place that I will call the greenlands and these green lands are absolutely stunning on the Eastern Bank of the river anduin we see fruit flourishing on branches Meadows painted with flowers great Gardens in full blossom for close to a century these green lands of Plenty have been home to calibrian and a number of the younger elves from her parents wandering company however elves are not the reason that these Gardens are so Bountiful and wonderful according to writings found in The Lord of the Rings this part of the world is at the end of the second age home to The Gardens of the antwides I have been wanting to talk about ant wives since the first episode of this series and now I finally can now they matter to the overarching plot only one and twife is ever named by Tolkien but luckily from a law perspective she would be the one that I would choose to focus on theme breath field one of the oldest and loveliest of all the ant wives wife of fangorn AKA Treebeard and the closest thing that these green lands have to a leader I imagine finger Thiel and calebrian would have a delightfully wholesome friendship they are two of the loveliest characters in the whole show but for that reason I am going to move on from them quite swiftly conflict is the engine of Storytelling and there is simply no conflict in The Gardens of the ant wives the purpose of the scene is simply to demonstrate that at this point in the story this right here is the nicest place in all of Middle Earth which is why it will contrast so diametrically with the worst place in Middle Earth 100 miles to the south of the greenlands lies the black land of morador we've heard a lot of talk about what sauron's been getting up to but now we're gonna need to see it as we transition over to mordador the first two things that we should see are the One Ring upon sauron's finger and before him the Colossal Tower of barad do by far the tallest tower in all of Middle Earth is a monument to sauron's Pride and his arrogance and his Dominion barad dur is not just a building it is fashioned in part by the power of the one there's a reason that Barra the door crumbles when the ring is destroyed and I think in this moment we need to see why that is the case is ludicrously humongous and its foundations are so purely evil that no technology could build it it is the power of the ring that keeps barretted door standing and it is because of the ring that The Dark Tower is unlike anything else left in ardida but then we should get our first clear look at season five Sauron and as has been the case with every previous season now Sauron has a nude look and season 5 Sauron is unlike any of his previous incarnations he could not be more different from The Lord of gifts back in season one he has written and then subsequently fallen so far that the character we met back in the cold opening is almost unrecognizable from what he's now become we know that after the downfall of numenor Sauron lost his ability to adopt a fair form his physical body now reflects the ugliness and the cruelty and the malice that boils inside him and it is finite if it is slain his naked spirit will have no way of interacting with the scene World his greatest asset his deception his guile his charm they are all gone now taking down numenora came at a massive cost and in the 100 years since season four Sauron has changed he's more hateful now he's more desperate and he's even more dangerous after a century of building his strength in secret Sauron is now ready for his final war the decisive Conflict for the fate of the next age and considering that building alliances is such a massive part of the first half of season five I think we should have at least one scene examining on the other side of that the forging of sauron's alliances Tolkien told us that no elves ever fought for Mordor and no Orcs ever fought for the alliance but among the other races of men dwarves birds and beasts there were at least some who fought on both sides so I think it would be cool to introduce two new kindreds of dwarves from far away to the east and south led by two Dwarven Chieftains who bear two of the seven Dwarven rings of power but these dwarves serve Sauron they swear loyalty to mordador upon their rings and in exchange they are promised a reward of Limitless gold and uncounted wealth After the Dark Lord's final Victory also I think there's an opportunity to briefly show the corruption of some men in parts of the world that Sauron occupies the second in command of The Naz ghoul was once a Chieftain of the easterlings and there are two besides the witch King who were once Lords of numenor so perhaps we can see The easterling Naz ghula Journey off into roon where he successfully recruits a bunch of Warlords to serve Sauron and overthrow the rightful leaders of the East whilst in the South the former numenorrhea Nazgul journey into harad and potentially manipulate the other half of that Harry dream royal family who despised the dunadine enough to join forces with Sauron the men of the black serpent however the Lord of The Naz ghoul and the other five Wing wraiths they do not go abroad as Messengers their skill set is saved for another task you see it is The Wraith who will one day be known as the witch King that Sauron uses as the weapon with which to land his first blow his first strike the opening Gambit of the war of the last Alliance the point of no return which brings us all the way back to Minas ethyl the Tower of isildur this is where it all begins on a chill night without moon when the silver lights of minus ethyl are at their dimmest a dreadful sound Echoes down from the mountains of Shadow the Screech Terror grips the city from the dark parts of the spider emerge the wraiths of Sauron they stand before the eastern wall of the city and their presence is like a nightmare descending upon the dunadine then when all consuming fear has truly set in there comes a flood Of Orcs teeming out of the night like ants out of a nest isildura and his three sons lead the defense of the East Gate but against the power of the Nazgul and the sudden onslaught of Orcs they cannot win The Naz ghoul's black breath overpowers he still doers Defenders and once the Orcs have scaled the walls and broken inside the Tower of the Moon it is the beginning of the end whilst a sealed door holds back the unending Legions his pregnant wife ayardian oversees The Escape of their people it's no longer about winning it's about surviving by the time the sun rises behind the mountains of Shadow and day finally comes again the Tower of the moon has fallen the city of isildur now Belongs to the Lord of The Naz ghoul and not for the last time Minas ethyl is corrupted into Minas moragul the Tower of dark sorcery however in the final moments of the fighting as the nasgow will sweep inside the city and All Is Lost isil dude cuts from his white tree a Seedling just like he did 100 Years Ago by stealing the last fruit of numenora's white tree nimloth isildura saves a Scion of this tree he ensures that the hope of the dunadine shall not be conquered with his City nevertheless though this is a massive defeat for Our Heroes sauron's Orcs burn gondor's first white tree Minas ethiola silver Radiance turned into what Tolkien called a corpse light which illuminates nothing and perhaps most significantly isildura's palantir falls into the possession of the dark lord which means the other five palantiri that connect to it are no longer safe to use the dunadine can no longer communicate via palantir without the Naz ghoul looking in lead the survivors of Minas ethyl to the capital of Australia and here they are reinforced and protected by a great host of a nadian strength that have come out of Minas and Noor Gondor is now at War and Eastern oscarliaf has become the front line Messengers are immediately sent to isil dur and anadion's supposed allies in the White Mountains and harad but when night falls again the men of osgeliath hear the Screech of The Naz ghoul once more however last time the gondorians were caught unawares this time they're not and although askiliath is famously a ruin at the time of The Lord of the Rings back at the end of the second age osgeliath is a pretty unconquerable capital of the dunadine it is a legacy of numedor and fun fact the reason that osgiliath is a ruin at the time of The Lord of the Rings is because it was destroyed during a civil war just like numenor the only thing that can take down gondor's capital is gondorians but anyway that is 1 400 years in the future right now even The Naz ghoul cannot crack us gileaf trouble is though they're not really trying to every night they emerge from the Blackness and fear descends on the city Orcs swarm the walls and although each and every one is slain and a thousand orc corpses are made visible by each rising of the sun when the sun sets again the Orcs return and with them come The Naz ghoul and the terror that they Inspire with their presence perhaps sometimes gondorian Riders can charge out from Australia to hunt the Orcs by daylight but when night falls the Orcs always come back and any Riders who don't return by Sunset are never seen again until one night at the hour before Dawn a great Thunder of hooves is heard riding up the harad road and through ethylia as the sun rises haradream Warriors descend upon the Orcs And as they charge into their ranks isildur a narion and their Cavalry join them in battle between the alliance of Gondor and harad every orc is slaughtered the Nazgul flea and the nightly attacks on osgeliath cease sauron's servants head north up the Eastern Banks off the anduin anyway the guy who led these horror Dream Warriors to gondor's Aid is of course the king of the Red Hawk the guy who swore an oath of friendship to a nadion but this king's distant cousin the Sauron supporter who represents a much darker side of haradrim society he has also ridden to war and also fought in this battle under the banner of the black serpent which means there are now two very different types of haradrim up in oscarliaf with the kings of Gondor however whereas the men of harad did come to the war when called upon they fulfilled their oath the men of the White Mountains did not they only come to askilia long after the fighting is over and so although they haven't quite broken their oath yet they certainly did not fulfill it their King can flippantly you know swear enough again to sealed or as a means of acquiring more gold and weapons but isildur is not happy if the men of the White Mountains do not come the next time they are called they shall be deemed oath Breakers they shall be unable to depart the circles of the world until their oath fulfilled dead yet unable to die they will be cursed with deathlessness anyway I imagine isildur and anarian would ride back to Minas ethyl as soon as they're able but when they return they find the land has been defiled the waters polluted The Meadows are sick and pale and poisonous fumes rise from the morgul veil so long as the Nazgul inhabit it Minas moragul cannot be retaken which means the palantiri are still compromised without the seeing stones of numenor the men of Gondor are going to have to send word to Ellen deal up in Arden or the old-fashioned way so the kings of Gondor to decide that anarion should stay in Australia with his son menel deal and their new allies from harad while isildur should sail with ayodian and their three sons up north to the gray Havens where they will then ride swiftly to their father in numinous with news that the war they've been fearing has now begun Gondor must have reinforcements from its allies or it will fall isil Dura and his company Depart of skeliac by ship they head south towards the sea and a narion and his family take the Reigns of ruling Gondor but sauron's attack on Australia that was only his opening move and it wasn't ever actually his plan to destroy Gondor in this moment that will come later instead the conquest of Minas ethyl was simply a tactic to force the eyes of his enemies towards their own borders to keep the eyes of the dunadine away from the north because it is just to the north that Sauron intends to deliver his second blow this will be far more brutal than the first so is the Orcs flee North along the river anduin the black gate of mordador opens and from the dark land emerges Sauron a raid for war to lead this attack in person and the reason I think it's so important to have Sauron take a direct role In This Moment is because what's about to happen is in my mind the worst thing that Sauron ever does and I am aware how huge of a statement that is this next scene isn't really about moving the plot forward it's a Showcase of how desperately abhorrent the dark lord has now become this needs to be the most harrowing scene in all five seasons I'm well aware that last season had a heavy focus on human sacrifice but this is even darker than that morally speaking this is sauron's lowest low one of his cruelest deeds the burning of the gardens of the ant wives so in Lord of the Rings we are told that this vast area of land that I've been calling the greenlands was during the war of the last Alliance absolutely burned to Ash by Sauron we'll see the heat of sauron's hand being used as a weapon towards the end of this season and this seems like a good place to establish that heat and Fire have replaced deception and guile as the weapons of the dark lord augmented by the power of the One Ring upon his finger Sauron Walks Into the Heart of the antwife's garden perhaps he can come face to face with theme breathil herself and then without warning or parlay or any hint of Honor soured on summons an evil flame that destroys everything the ant wives are burned alive their Gardens wither their green lands are consumed and when the fire of sauron's Inferno turns to Plumes of black smoke all that's left of the most beautiful place in all of Middle Earth is a desert this place shall forever afterwards be known as the brown lands even 3 000 years later when the fellowship Journey Down the River anduin after leaving lothlorian they will pass a vast desolation on the Eastern Bank of the river that Tolkien describes as formless slopes stretching up brown and withered they looked as if fire had passed over them leaving no living blade of green an unfriendly waste without even a broken tree after Sauron comes to these Gardens the land is destroyed Beyond recovery he has ensured that if any enemy ever descends upon mordador from the north they will have nothing but miles of Ash to March through and of course after this no ant wives are ever seen again they are lost tree beard holds on to hope that some may still be living somewhere but honestly I fear that this is wishful thinking all the evidence suggests that the ant wives were incinerated in their own Gardens by Sauron at the beginning of this war or potentially worse enslaved maybe we can leave a little bit of ambiguity perhaps an ant wife can be seen fleeing East but I think we need to see the rest of them die we need to know just how hateful and awful Sauron has become because I really don't think that season one Sauron would have done this he would certainly have tried taking dominion over the entwife's gardens but I think he would have done so through manipulation and with a fair form but he can't do that anymore deception is no longer his weapon all Sauron has now to wield his hatred and Malice and the heat of his hand so along with the ant wives I imagine that many of the Woodland elves who lived in this region would also be burned alive but there has to be at least a few survivors and the one who gathers these survivors and takes charge in guiding them away from the devastation should be calibrian she has just watched her friends die her home burn and her innocence turned to Cinders but just like her mother calebrian now has no choice but to become a guardian for her people she leads the weak weary and wounded elves away from the smoldering Brown lands through the smoke over scorched Earth and up to the Woodland Bridge of the gala dream where she'll be reunited with her parents Galadriel and kelleborn when calebrian tells of the genocide of the ant wives both galadwiel and kalaborn understand the magnitude of what this means the second age is ending the war for everything to come has already begun so the time has come for this family to split up they each have a task to do and a journey to undertake as the mightiest Prince of the sindar it is up to calibon to unite the elves of the East the Sundar and Sylvan of the woodlands the galadrim who have lived peacefully in their Woods for one and a half thousand years but now that peace must come to an end The Wider World cannot forever be fenced out so Keller born is the Viewpoint character through which I think we should explore the role of thrandwheeler's Woodland Army in the North and the Sylvan Army of the golden wood the gala dream who will join the last Alliance and then later in the third age become known as the wood elves of merkwood and Loth Lorien however Galadriel would I think be wasted in this storyline while her husband is finding balance between sindar and Sylvan elves Galadriel should head north up into the Wilds of rovanion in search of a very very old friend slash potentially if you think about it former foe as I've already said everything galatriel does this season has to be entirely invented there is no faithful way to feature her in season five yet I think it would be a real shame to sideline her and there is a blink and you miss it detail about the war of the last Alliance that I not only find fascinating to ponder but I also think is a great opportunity to explore the culmination of the galadriel's character Arc while simultaneously keeping her relevant to the plot Tolkien tells us that the last Alliance comprised of elves men dwarves birds and beasts but apart from the elves there were also some from each race who fought against the alliance in service of Sauron we've had plenty of focus so far on elves and men and dwarves but I would really like to feature a storyline that introduces the birds and beasts of the last Alliance and I think Galadriel is a worthy character to serve as a point of view for that side plot so she travels North alone through the Wilds of ravanion between the Misty Mountains and the river anduin she crosses the Gladden fields which we'll see again in the final episode and eventually she comes to the great stone that will by the time of The Hobbit be known as the carock and in The Hobbit the guy who came up with the name carock is Bayonne the skin changer now this is taking place almost 3 000 years before The Hobbit so I'm definitely not suggesting that Bayonne should be like alive at this time but I do feel there's good inspiration here that can be used to explore the birds and beasts of season five I guess we don't need to be too creative to suggest that the beasts who fought for Sauron would have included Wags and werewolves and yes we do have the rights to werewolves thanks to Gandalf in The Lord of the Rings although I should point out that tolkien's werewolves are not shapeshifters they're just giant evil wolves inhabited by an evil spirit anyway I would suggest that Wards and werewolves represent the beasts of Sauron but the ancestors of balon's people could perhaps be the face of the beasts who fight for the alliance we know from The Hobbit that the gigantic black bears of rovanion are particular enemies of the evil wolves and so I'm imagining Galadriel journeying to meet with a tribe of bears and convincing them to Aid her in the Final War of the age I don't want to lean too hard on the whole Bayonne thing he is his own character living Millennia after the story takes place and also I actually think these Bears might be more interesting if we don't see them change shape they are for all intents and purposes just giant wild bears but they understand galadriel's speech and they have a language of their own and although every member of the tribe is a giant bear perhaps they could care for babies that are of the race of men this is a place where the line between bear and person is blurred and in 3000 years this blurred line will lead to the bayonings of the late third age however as much as I do enjoy bears and Bayonne they are not the only reason Galadriel journeyed all this way after successfully making some new friends she heads off towards the Misty Mountains and climbs up towards the Eerie of the great wind Lord guay here now guay here is obviously a fan favorite character but again I think there should be more to his interactions with Galadriel than simply fan service back in season 4 we established that the great Eagles are witnesses of the Valar and we know from the appendices that Galadriel and the Noel Dora left valinor against the will of the valard back in the first age so although we don't have the right to Distillery on specifics we do have everything we need to portray a pretty interesting relationship between these two characters guay here and Galadriel back in the Eldar days during the time of morigoth guay here and his Eagles were sent to Middle Earth as Witnesses of the valarduel came with the noldor as Rebels against the valard back in the deeps of time guay here and galadual both came to Middle Earth at the same time as part of the same event but on very different sides now that conflict's been over for 3 000 years and most vestiges of that ancient time are gone but galadwiel and guay here remain relics of the first age still going strong at the end of the second age however both these characters definitely have the wisdom to recognize that regardless of how they first came to Middle Earth they are on the same side now we do not need to manufacture conflict between these good guys there are way cooler things to explore because of course there are birds and beasts on both sides of this war and in the Return of the King Tolkien uses some very interesting language to describe the winged steeds used by The Naz ghoul the fell beasts these creatures are often portrayed in adaptations as looking like some kind of a dragon but tolkien's language makes it sound very much more like they're a type of featherless bird or perhaps even like some fantasy version of a pterosaur Tolkien describes a creature of an older World maybe it was whose kind lingering and forgotten Mountains Cold outstayed their day and in hideous Eerie bread this last untimely Brew the dark lord took it and nursed it with fell Meats until it grew beyond the measure of all other things that fly now that specific language is in reference to the witch King Steed during the Battle of pelenor fields but it hints at a much older type of winged evil that could have served Sauron in the second age and whatever those things were surely only guay here and the other great Eagles could challenge its Mastery of the Skies anyway whilst all of this is happening with Galadriel her daughter calabrian's storyline is much more intimately bound to the main plot of season five she leads what remains of her wandering company up the Silver Load River towards the valley that is known amongst the elves as nandu hirion among men as the dimwill Dale and among dwarves as Aza nulabazar it is here that the East Gate of kazad Doom can be found just as calebrian did multiple times throughout seasons one and two she passes beneath the Misty Mountains and follows the dwarf Road of kazad Doom all the way to the doors of durin on the west side of the mountains as she does she learns that King Duren IV and his son Prince flowy are currently up in imaladuris forming an alliance with the Elven Lord who lives there and so kelebrian leads her her people all the way up to Rivendell and here she finally gets to spend some time with her future husband elrond so I'll come back to Riverdale in just a minute but at around the same time Caleb Rihanna comes to elerond with news of sauron's devastating attack about 200 Leagues to the West isildur and his family arrive at the gray Havens with terrible news of Their Own is still do the ship is met by kieradan at the gray Havens and when isil Dude explains to High King Gilling Gallard that Sauron has Unleashed War upon Gondor the last Alliance begins to take shape and this really is what Gil gallard's character Arc has been building two throughout the entire story in season one he was a relatively young warrior king obsessed with eradicating any and all evil from his newly founded Kingdom in season 2 he proved his prowess as a warrior he fought beside numenorians and prevented Sauron from conquering Lindon but it was a bit of a pirate Victory and though Sauron lost the war he did end up winning the piece so during seasons 3 and 4 Gila Garland put down his great Spear iogloss and he transitioned from a warrior king of Lindon into the far-sighted commander of all sauron's enemies he began building alliances first with Duren IV then with Ellen deal and so in season five Gili Gallard must take up Aya gloss again he must embody the warrior king of seasons one and two again he must finish what he started back in the war of the elves and Sauron but now he is enriched with the wisdom of 2700 years now Gil galad has an alliance as we enter the second half of season five we should begin an episode with Gili galad in Lindon he's putting on his silver male he's sharpening the blade of iron gloss kieridan is with him a raid for war beneath a starry night sky the elves of Lindon gather before their High King as an army ready for battle and their three sons are with kyradan and they are all watching Gili Gallard intently after some kind of Epic speech probably Gila Gallard rides East away from his capital and the entire host of the noldor rides with him a great Army of High Elves ride out from Lindon towards a war from which many will never return gilgalat himself is leaving Lindon for the final time he rides beneath the stars towards the sunrise and as day comes we see Ellen deal standing upon a great Hill looking West towards the coming of giligalad isildur and the Elven Army and this scene is taken straight out of Fellowship of the Ring in the chapter a knife in the dark we are told that this place where Ellen deals stood and awaited the coming of giligalad and the alliance was none other than the great Dunedin Watchtower of Armon seul which will in later days be known as weathertop at weathertop Ln deals Manish Army of adenor Unites with the elevation Army of Lindon and the two High Kings ride with their armies together along the Great East Road over the last Bridge across the Ford of brewinen and down into the valley of imladuis which means most of our main characters are now all in one location Rivendell where we have a great opportunity to showcase many meetings many different interactions between characters who have not met before for example kierdan the shipwright and Prince flowy of Kaza Doom not a natural pairing but I imagine these two would have a lot of interesting things to say to each other however the most important of all these many meetings is definitely the one between the show's two kind of Main protagonists seildur and elerond we absolutely have to spend a good chunk of time growing the friendship between these two their relationship is simultaneously a climax to the whole elarond and Ella Ross relationship that began our whole story don't forget isil Dura is a direct descendant of eleron's twin brother but this friendship will also go on to define a massive part of the third age the whole elarond Aragon arawan thing the whole Heirs of isil dood are being raised in Rivendell thing that begins with this friendship between elerond and isildur and this friendship can trace its Origins all the way back to season three when eleron spent years hanging out with isildur's now wife ayardian and I guess the first thing that elrond would notice upon seeing ayodian again n would be that by now she is heavily pregnant we are actually told that isil Dura and his wife have their fourth child in the very same year as the founding of the last Alliance and I think it would be really nice to contrast the impending doom of war with new life being born in Rivendell the fourth born child of isildur is another son called valandil and although he's only a baby right now from a law perspective that on deal is a really important character as another heir of Ellen deals I imagine the birth of ballon deal would be considered an auspicious Omen among the dunadine it's a moment of down to earth human happiness nestled amid a pretty epic tragedy anyway for plot reasons as well as character reasons I reckon aileron should be the one to tend to ayardn as she recovers from childbirth and he should be there with isildur when he holds his son for the first time from elderon's deathless perspective he is valentil's uncle just 25 Generations removed seriously I cannot overstate the significance of elderon's Friendship with the new minorian royal family it kind of really is what the whole five seasons of this story have been about but there's a lot more to talk about so I will briefly move on to alarond's blossoming friendship potential romance with calebrian I'm not suggesting that season 5 should pivot into a rom-com the romance of elerond and calabrian is irrelevant to the story at hand they won't actually get married or have any children until the third age but their relationship is worth introducing I think they've both been present since the very beginning of season one and back then they were both very young elves now they're not calibrian has just undergone a harrowing trauma but elerond Is A Healer and Rivendell is a place of Peace together they bond they share their Joys and their sorrows and they celebrate the new life of Valen deal Rivendell becomes a new home for calabrion also while elerond is building his friendship with isil dude I think there is a neat possibility for calebrian to build a friendship with ayardian back in season 3 ayardian did the exact same Journey that calibrian's just done but in reverse while traveling down the river anduin ayardian also spent time among the ant wives and so I imagine that learning of their fiery demise from calabrion would be pretty heartbreaking for ayardian and yet from sorrow comes pity and kindness and sympathy that is a theme that Tolkien wove into all of his writings perhaps by grieving the ant wives together ayarden and calebrian can reinforce the other side of that isil dur elrond friendship and while we're on the topic of calabrian eventually her mother galadia should also come to email Audrey's perhaps upon the back of a great eagle and I think there's a very important meeting that needs to be shown between galadwiel ellerond and Ellen deal a scene to tie up some of the themes that were explored back in season one regarding Galadriel and her brother finrod felagund back in season 3 Galadriel met isildur and anadian and in season 4 she met them again when they washed up on the shores of what's now called Gondor but she's never met elen deal before and it is Ln deal who wears the Ring of Barra here the ring that he inherited from elleros numenora's first king but as I've mentioned back in the first age this ring was originally gifted to a mortal ancestor of elarossas called barah here by galadwiel's Brother friend of men finrod feligund he was the original owner of this ring he gifted it to the Mortal barahir as a token of abiding friendship before he gave up his life to save the son of barahir Baron so this ring means three very different things to these three different characters and the three perspectives of Ellen deal ellerond and Galadriel illuminate an important through line of middle Earth's backstory Ellen deal sees the Ring of barahir as a symbol of his descent from silamarian it is an heirloom of the faithful elrond however he sees it as a token of friendship between him and all new minorians throughout the entire second age but Galadriel she sees it as an even more ancient token or friendship between her brother and the entire race of men going back into the deeps of the first Age The Alliance that's forming right now has roots that go back to the Elder days and the Ring of barahir is proof of what Frodo says in The Two Towers the great Tales never end the people in them come and go when their parts are finished but this is all one massive story from finward and barahir in the first age to the elves and numenorians of the second age to Aragon and arawan of the third age it's all the same Tale the great stories never end is another one of those Central themes of tolkien's writings anyway the final meeting that I want to mention is a big scene featuring King elendil and King durin IV gilgalat should also be present as these are the three High Kings of the last Alliance but apart from a few brief moments with ayardian back in season three we have never seen a meeting between a dwarf of Cozad doom and a numenorian Ellen deal and during the fourth are on the one hand from entirely separate worlds and they seem to have very little in common yet on the other hand they are true equals the greatest Kings of the greatest kingdoms of their respective races and together it is these three kings who will either lead the last Alliance to Victory or die upon the battlefield potentially both now if we follow tolkien's timeline to the letter we'll actually need to spend three years in Rivendell building this last Alliance and making preparations for the war to end the second age and although a three-year time Jump would be a good way of demonstrating just how big of a deal the last Alliance is I can see the argument why another time jumps so close to the end of the story might like undercut the immediacy of what's happening it's not great for pacing and it would be a little bit weird for a seal dirt to spend three years away from Gondor while his brother anarian is alone on the front lines there totally are ways to include these three years but they'd have to involve inventing a few new scenes and honestly there are more important moments for me to get into so for the sake of this video I will condense those three years in Rivendell down to a few months perhaps at the end of those months there can be another great Council sort of like a Proto Council of elorond where all our main characters finalize and formalize their Alliance they can Bid Farewell to ayarden and valandil and calibrian and the other non-combatants and then we are finally ready for the good guys to strike back for the war of the last Alliance to officially begin so first the three High Kings must move their respective armies from the western side of the Misty Mountains to the Eastern side from eriador to rovanion and all the inspiration that we could possibly need for this next part of our adaptation is right here on tolkien's map there are a number of ways to cross the Misty Mountains from Rivendell and I'm imagining perhaps like an elite Vanguard potentially led by elrond and isildur might take the high pass that's right behind Rivendell that's the same pass that Bilbo and the dwarves will use in The Hobbit and I mentioned this high pass because it introduces an important detail that'll come back right at the end of this series Tolkien told us that before the Alliance came to mordador Sauron sent as many Orcs as he could spare up into the Misty Mountains to Harry and waylay his enemies as they try to cross so as this Elite Vanguard led by a seal dude descends the Eastern slopes of the mountains and they enter into the Wilds of rovanion a war Band Of Orcs spies them they are in a position to Ambush these soldiers and slaughter them in the highlands but they don't you see the soldiers of the last Alliance they follow their kings out of loyalty and Duty and love but sauron's Orcs do not love him they are not loyal to his cause they are cowardly brutes motivated by hate against a heavily armed and highly trained Vanguard of top Warriors all of these Orcs will surely be killed and turns out these Orcs fear the steel of the alliance more than their Master far off in Mordor so instead of attacking the Vanguard the Orcs going back up into the Misty Mountains to await easier prey Sauron has screwed himself over with his own tyranny anyway as I say I'll come back to the specific awk warband of the Misty Mountains and that theme of self-defeating evil towards the end of the next video and if you know how this story goes you can probably guess why I'm mentioning this but I think the bulk of the last Alliance they should cross into the East Via the same route that The Fellowship of the Ring will take in over 3 000 years time the passage under the mountains kazad Doom I think there's potential for a really cool sequence showing the alliance of elves and men and dwarves all marching South together through the now ancient ruins of eregion into the halls of kazadum and then out the other side down the Silver Load River towards the golden wood all armed and a raid for war which brings us to the other reason why I mentioned that invented Woodland bridge between the Realms of galavone and thrandwheel that bridge over the anduin whilst most of our main characters were preparing in Rivendell kellerborne has been working to persuade his fellow cindar princes to allow their forests to be the last alliance's final Haven before they March upon the black gate and kelleborn has convinced them to widen their Bridge so that the armies of the last Alliance may cross the river without delay I mean I'm aware that a bridge might not be most cinematic storyline to invent in a Middle-earth adaptation but I do think it's worth spending a short amount of time on I really don't want to have characters teleporting wherever the plot needs them to be this is Middle Earth this is Tolkien The Journey matters and so I think we should demonstrate how does a massive Army like the last Alliance swiftly cross a massive River like the anduin it'll make the world feel more real and it's also a nice way of exploring our alliance theme Bridges you know connect people this bridge literally unite two Woodland kingdoms and it demonstrates that every single group or three peoples are playing their part in the war of the last Alliance anyway it is in this Woodland realm that Gila galad's Army is reinforced and enriched by the armies of Gala Thorne and thrandwheel and one all the elves and men and dwarves and birds and beasts have gathered and once the Great River has been crossed The High Kings Gila Gallard Ellen deal and Ado in the fourth lead their armies onward to mordador and once the green Woodlands are behind them the last Alliance faces the final stage of its Journey 100 leagues of desert finally our heroes are entering the Dominion of the dark lord after days of marching and riding through somber desolation the last Alliance eventually comes to the razor-sharp Labyrinth of Hills known as the emmyin wheel they are now barely a stone's throw from the black gate and it's in the Eminem wheel that I imagine the alliance would Unite with their final batch of Warriors Atop The High Cliff's weights King and nadion with a large company of gondorian soldiers ready for battle and among them are the fighting men of harad Warriors of both those factions flying both banners the Red Hawk of their king and the black Serpent of his rival noticeably however the men of the White Mountains are not present once again they have broken their oath and refused to fight for isildur anyway during a very Rainy Night great Eagles and other birds of the alliance fly south from the Emin wheel to spy out the lands ahead and they were turned with news of the enemy's strength and whereabouts and the birds report that the black gate is open a single War Band Of Orcs is preparing for battle but the bulk of sauron's army cannot be seen now both Gili galad and Ellen deal agree that they should rest they should build a strategy and then begin her greatest battle of the second age in the light of day and on their own terms but not everyone agrees the Woodland galavrim they want to launch a surprise attack right now they are after all wood elves stealth and Ambush are their preferred styles of war and they reckon that by striking in the night they can take the armies of mordador unaware they can win the war before Sauron even knows that they're here also a big part of King Gala Thorne's personality is that he's a pretty prideful guy who really doesn't like the noldor he has come to fight saudon but as a sinduine king of the Woodland the commands of High King gilligalad of the noldor mean nothing Gala Thorne convinces thrandwheel to join him and together the Woodland armies depart the Eminem wheel to launch a surprise attack against the forces of morador Gala Thorne Begins the battle against the orders of High King Gill Gallard and among the men of the last Alliance something very similar happens the horror dream who fly the banners of the black serpent make the exact same argument about Ellen deal that galavone made about Gila Garland Ellen deal is High King of the dunadine not of the horror dream the Harry dream have their own Kings why should they be beholden to the orders of Ellen deal now I imagine that a nadion would really try to dissuade the Harry Dream from this line of thinking as surely kelleborne would also try to do with galavorn and frandwheel but in the end the majority of the haradrim follow the galavrim to launch a surprise attack upon morador by night which brings us to the first major battle of the war of the last Alliance now in the unfinished Tales we are given an account of a very similar battle featuring characters that unfortunately just don't have the rights to name so this is going to have to be an invented battle but I've tried to include as many threads from the writings that we can use as possible and the first thread that I want to use this battle to explore is a seemingly throwaway line from Fellowship of the Rings Council of elyrond chapter in that chapter eleron says in all the long Wars with the Dark Tower treason has ever been our greatest foe and I find this line really interesting because considering the evidence that Tolkien gives us I'm not quite sure if it's true or rather it's not really supported by second age law treason of kin unto kin is a massive part of the first age but I can't really think of any example in the second or third ages where treason played a significant role in the wars with the Dark Tower Pride deception fear ambition these could all be considered great foes in the long Wars with the Dark Tower but treason really not in the second age so I think if we are going to have to invent some things then this treason that elwon speaks of in The Lord of the Rings should be part of what's explored and of course it is this treason that I've been building towards with the whole Red Hawk black serpent thing among the Harry dream after journeying with the wood elves under the cover of night and finally coming within sight of the black gate the leader of the black serpent finally reveals his treachery he stands beside his distant cousin the king of the red hawk and The Good King reinforces the importance of kinship between them he says that when the war is over there lands in harad will prosper again the black serpent agrees yes they will and then he draws his sword and before the black gate of Mordor he murders his cousin and his King the lord of the black serpent unfills his banners and declares his loyalty to Sauron and in an instant the planned Ambush turns into a massacre followers of the black serpent ruthlessly betray the horror dream of the Red Hawk and before the black gate itself the Faithful Men of harad are murdered by their own countrymen the war of the last Alliance begins with disaster and in the very moment that the loyal Hara dream are betrayed and Chaos breaks out a man of the black serpent blows his horn and the armies of Mordor spring their trap suddenly The Elves and men are the ones being ambushed in chapter 14 of the two towers Tolkien wrote beneath the hills on either side of the black gate was bored into a hundred caves and maggot holes there a host of Orcs lurked ready at a signal to issue fourth like black ants going to war this is what I'm imagining for this scene Orcs swarming from the secret maggot holes within the Rocks thousands suddenly spawning onto the battlefield and overwhelming the surviving Harry dream and the gala dream this isn't really a battle anymore it's just Carnage and treason and Slaughter I've said many times before on this channel that tolkien's writing should not be taken as allegory we should not be projecting tolkien's own wartime experiences for example onto the wars of Middle Earth Tolkien himself said as much in letter 226 however there is an exception in that same letter Tolkien divulged that perhaps in landscape the dead marshes and the approach of the owes something to northern France after the battle of the Somme and what I'm talking about here is taking place in exactly that part of the world the elves and men who die here will in 3000 years time become the bodies that Frodo and Sam encounter in the dead marshes moranon is simply the sindhuin word for black gate and so if there ever were a place and a time in tolkien's adaptation where it is appropriate to take inspiration from the horrors of World War One and specifically the psalm I think this would be it I'm imagining that rain has turned the Ashen ground to Mud Arrows fly like bullets and bodies float face down in these bloody pools I think to really capture just how horrifying this battle is we need to pick a single character and kind of witness the Carnage through their eyes and I very strongly believe that this character should be thrond wheel I'm imagining that pretty early on in this fight thrandwheel would be wounded by a Straight Arrow he would fall in the mud and as he lies there he looks up and he sees that all around him his people are being slaughtered Gullah Thorne his fellow King is butchered by a whole bunch of Orcs brutally slain and his blood seeps into the mud while his body is Trampled Under orc feet the gala dream with their light knives and their slender bows are massacred one by one and the Faithful Men of harad are killed beside them the figure that Tolkien gives us in the unfinished Tales is that two-thirds of the Woodland Army are killed in this battle two-thirds this is the trauma that will Define so much of thrandwheel's character for the next 3 000 years this is the reason that elves of the Greenwood will Retreat so far north in the early third age it's the reason that the elves of the golden wood will become so isolationist by the time of The Lord of the Rings I mean the Awakening of the battlework didn't help but at the end of the second age a great Woodland Army marched South to war but only a handful returned king galathorn and the majority of his Gala Dream Will Remain buried in the mud for millennia and as their graves are slowly swallowed up by the foulness of this region their final resting place shall become known as the dead marshes and the slaughter that thrandwheel Witnesses here changes the role that wood elves will play throughout the third age the sindar and the Sylvan will continue to dwell in the forests of rovanion but their lands will become massively depopulated their Realms will shrink immensely and Their Kingdoms will never again even come close to the size and the Grandeur that they reached before this battle but as thrandwheel lies bleeding watching his people die and his hope die with them he suddenly feels the Thunder of hooves approaching from the north he hears the call of an eagle and the Battle Cry of the dwarves and the coming of the three High Kings the sun begins to rise the Orcs pull back the surviving elves and faithful haradine regroup and the rest of the last Alliance descends upon the enemy and as they do the great battle of dagorlad officially Begins the greatest battle since the war of Wrath which brought a cataclysmic end to the first age and that is perhaps a little frustratingly where I'm going to have to end this video there's a lot more Story to Tell in season five but I will tell it in the next video and I hope that what you've heard so far has got you excited for the finale the last few episodes to tie this entire three and a half thousand year long wings of power story together I will talk about the Battle of dagoralad the siege of baradur the battle of Sauron elendil and giligalad the moment isil Dora cuts the ring from sauron's finger and how I imagine everything that I have talked about over these like 10 hours worth of videos should end so to make sure you don't miss that hit subscribe if you haven't already and be sure to hit like and leave a comment with your thoughts if you want to however until next time until the finale as always my dear friends much love stay groovy and Nevada melanin [Music]

Channel: Tolkien Untangled

Views: 229,603

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Id: PtaryGHbvBQ

Length: 130min 49sec (7849 seconds)

Published: Sat Dec 17 2022