Yay, new thread!
The friction between Fëanor and Fingolfin is tricky. Like Haakon, I think it should pull in all of the Noldor - so we are going to hear voices saying that Finwë should never have remarried and this wouldn't have happened, or people defending Fingolfin as the good noble wonderful elf that he is. Obviously, if Fingolfin has been listening to Melkor, he plays into this as well. But what do they themselves think?
Fëanor has been moving towards becoming secretive and guarded. Now is where we see him displaying paranoia. Something tips him over into that - what? What could possibly happen to make him go from guarding his thoughts, possessions and family to being paranoid and suspicious of attack? Does someone break into his house and try to steal the silmarils? Does his habit of spending time outside of Tirion (is that something he is doing, by the by - living outside the city?) cause him to miss some event that he didn't even know about because no one thought to tell his family about it? Does someone try to beat him at craftsmanship- maybe publicly musing that he's hit his peak with the silmarils and it's all downhill from there? I don't have a good feel on what a good event would be to incite epic levels of paranoia in someone who has been skilled at everything he put his hand to since he was a small child, and whose rivals are actually his younger half-brothers who show him deference, mostly.
Fingolfin's uneasiness has to come from multiple fronts as well. It can't just be him-vs-Fëanor. He has to realize that some of his people will never accept him as a 'true' son of Finwë, cause of that whole remarriage-to-Indis thing. He's half-Vanyar, so not even a real Noldo. His father clearly dotes on his firstborn, so he might feel he has something to prove there as well. No one associates this kind of vulnerability with Fingolfin. Clearly, he gets over it after being abandoned in Araman and striking out on his own. But can he even go through this now? Even if it is...temporary...will there be insecurities for Melkor to work on? And that's where the Fingolfin-listens-to-Melkor storyline comes in handy. We can easily give Melkor the role of offering 'reassurances' that things aren't really that bad and of course people don't really think {repeats baseless gossip}. So while he might sound like he's trying to help, he's just reinforcing and throwing it in Fingolfin's face. But it's still really hard to see Fingolfin (of all people) getting worried about this.
Finarfin as go-between peacemaker stuck in the middle (but obviously siding with Fingolfin) seems necessary.
As for the 3rd generation - oh, they're involved alright. Fëanor and Fingolfin are going full-out Hatfields and McCoys, and here's their eldest sons being best-friends-for-life on the sidelines. Whether Maedhros and Fingon try to talk some sense into their fathers, or whether they get yelled at by their fathers for fraternizing with the enemy, or even just privately discuss the dilemma amongst themselves....it has to come up. Too perfect not to use that situation.
The children of Finarfin (Finrod, Angrod, Aegnor and Galadriel) have to spend some time in this episode with their Teleri cousins in Alqualondë (because up until now, we haven't really explained that Finarfin married Olwë's daughter Earwen). They are removing themselves from the feud by getting out of Tirion and just not being part of it, but it can still come up. Angrod and Aegnor think that Fëanor is being ridiculous, and of course side with Fingolfin (and his sons - they're friends with Fingon and Turgon). We wanted Galadriel to be close friends with one of the Teleri (possibly one of the children of Olwë's sons - so her cousin), and for the two of them to discuss the possibility of going to Middle Earth and exploring new lands. Perhaps this cousin is a great mariner who dreams of sailing beyond sight of shore, over the horizon.... Anyway - they discuss these dreams so we care when said cousin dies in the Kinslaying, and also so we'll understand Galadriel's motivation in joining the rebellion whilst being firmly anti-Fëanor. This elf maybe owes something to the character of Teleporno in one of the versions of Galadriel's history, but of course we're making him a cousin, not a romantic interest (and he'll need a new name).
[Some of the Galadriel questions were discussed in this thread:
http://forums.signumuniversity.org/index.php?threads/galadriel.350/ ]
Does Aredhel maintain her friendship with Curufin and Celegorm? Or does the feud put an end to her childhood friendship with them? Either way is fine, but if she's explicitly told not to spend time with them, I would want to see some defiance from her on that one.
