Concerns About Season Four

I agree about the laughable thing. I also agreee that salgant should not he grotesque fat, but he can be a bit more squad than the common eldarian beauty ideal. What i like about salgant was his ambiguous character, he is described in many ways so negative, but young earendil liked him as the old elf used to play and laugh with the kid... and i like that, an old elf who is not that perfect, who is not the ideal of valor and beauty we expect from the noldor, but he is a kind character to the small half elven child.
So how should we have him gravitate towards Maeglin?
 
obesity is a disease inflicted by modern processed food, or really unlucky genes. Gondolin isn't the land of soda, corn syrup, and MSG.

This isn't strictly true. This may be the reason for the obesity epidemic in the US, but being overweight is not something new by any stretch. Usually a sign of opulence, history is replete with people described as being fat. That said, I feel like it is a decidedly unelvish trait, at least as Elves eventually came to be described. Am I correct in believing that this Salgant character is from an earlier draft?
 
This isn't strictly true. This may be the reason for the obesity epidemic in the US, but being overweight is not something new by any stretch. Usually a sign of opulence, history is replete with people described as being fat. That said, I feel like it is a decidedly unelvish trait, at least as Elves eventually came to be described. Am I correct in believing that this Salgant character is from an earlier draft?
He’s mainly featured in Lost Tales, and his corpulent physique makes him unique amongst the Elves.
 
Beleg is also not slim, but he is very strong built also, while salgant is described as weak and lazy.

How do we make salgant drift towards maeglin.. well maybe fear? Salgant is not a real colaborator as i see it he merely keeps quiet about maeglin and does as he wishes.I think Maeglin should know how to intimidate people and Salgant is an obvious target..

But that is maybe more important concerning season 5 or 6, unless we find salgant so interesting that we introduce him some time earlier to give him more of a backstory...
 
Salgant: http://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/Salgant

We will no doubt start to flesh out Turgon's court here in Season 4 (introducing Glorfindel and Ecthelion at the very least in Nevrast), but I agree that the Gondolin politics concerning Maeglin will mostly have to wait until later. Depending on where Season 4 ends, Maeglin may not even be born yet! We will need the Houses of Gondolin and the lords of those houses, but....no decisions have been made of that yet.

Salgant is in "The Fall of Gondolin" from Lost Tales. The story that Corey Olsen *most* wishes Tolkien had written a later version of, as the unfinished 'Coming of Tuor to Gondolin' in Unfinished Tales gave us a glimpse of what kind of treatment that could have been. But, alas, it was not to be, and we're stuck with the 1917 tale as the last thing Tolkien ever wrote about the fall of Gondolin, one of the key parts of his mythos! It's...an odd tale, in many ways. It features mechanical (tank) dragons, and thousands of balrogs (behaving as the later trolls). Salgant is the coward, who hides in his bed when the attack on the city happens. He's also one of the Lords of Gondolin, leader of the House of the Harp. That's where we get the story of Glorfindel slaying a balrog, and the 'original' Legolas Greenleaf. The sortie outside the walls of Rog of the House of the Hammer of Wrath. And the Maeglin-Idril-Tuor triangle is most fleshed out there. Etc. Basically, nearly all the details mentioned in the published Silmarillion are there, but not everything fits.

Anyway, we will no doubt take *elements* of that story, but we are certainly going to be adapting anything we take from there to be consistent with the rest of the story.
 
Last edited:
Yeah, I'd prefer a Salgant who is an entirely decent person, and not at all complicit in Maeglin's treachery. I also find it hard to believe that the House of the Mole would help him assault Idril, kidnap Earendil, and accept his orders to stand aside and allow the Orcs to sack the city. There's just no way. Maeglin was compromised, but I can't imagine that other Noldor would have helped him once they realized he was a traitor. Some would be in denial until they heard it from Idril or Tuor's own mouth, out of discomfort at what that makes them. But I'd much rather see the whole House of the Mole unanimously defect from their lord as soon as they learn the truth, with several deliberately staying behind to fight to their death against the invaders because they feel dishonored by having served Maeglin.

Re obesity: OK, I belive you that obesity can result from overeating healthy food, but yeah, purposely overeating isn't an Elvish trait either. Elves are distinguished as being vastly less affected by bodily desires than Mortals are.

Beleg, I think, is described as of great girth because he had a huge pack hidden under his cloak in that passage . That is, I think the girth was the pack, not Beleg himself. I could be wrong.
 
Yeah, I'd prefer a Salgant who is an entirely decent person, and not at all complicit in Maeglin's treachery. I also find it hard to believe that the House of the Mole would help him assault Idril, kidnap Earendil, and accept his orders to stand aside and allow the Orcs to sack the city. There's just no way. Maeglin was compromised, but I can't imagine that other Noldor would have helped him once they realized he was a traitor. Some would be in denial until they heard it from Idril or Tuor's own mouth, out of discomfort at what that makes them. But I'd much rather see the whole House of the Mole unanimously defect from their lord as soon as they learn the truth, with several deliberately staying behind to fight to their death against the invaders because they feel dishonored by having served Maeglin.

Re obesity: OK, I belive you that obesity can result from overeating healthy food, but yeah, purposely overeating isn't an Elvish trait either. Elves are distinguished as being vastly less affected by bodily desires than Mortals are.

Beleg, I think, is described as of great girth because he had a huge pack hidden under his cloak in that passage . That is, I think the girth was the pack, not Beleg himself. I could be wrong.
On that note, maybe Salgant is an unwitting pawn.
 
Salgant himself did not know of maeglins treachery, at least not in detail, and he himself does not take part in it other than sending his troops to the wrong place and not taking part in the fighting himself.

As for the house of the mole, they openly refused to follow meglins orders in attacking their own people as far as i remember... but we still have to solve how we depict maeglins fall& treason and how much of it was maeglins own corruption, how much of it was torture, magic, possession (?) And if maeglin was the only other elf captured or if some of his comrades shared his experience and also "fell", maybe a few other captured miners also became corrupted but certainly not his entire house!
 
I know that there was some discussion quite a while ago, probably in the "Sauron's Morgoth Moment" thread, about exactly how involved Sauron should be in Maeglin's fall and treason, and how it fits at the same time into the rivalry between Sauron and Gothmog. I don't remember the consensus we came to then (if we even did) - it seemed so far in the future haha.
 
Yeah, we hadn't solved the issue back then, luckily we still have time for it... until season 6 or 7 i suspect .
 
I know that there was some discussion quite a while ago, probably in the "Sauron's Morgoth Moment" thread, about exactly how involved Sauron should be in Maeglin's fall and treason, and how it fits at the same time into the rivalry between Sauron and Gothmog. I don't remember the consensus we came to then (if we even did) - it seemed so far in the future haha.
I thought Sauron just spent the rest of the First Age, or until Beleriand was destroyed, wasting time in Taur-nu-Fuin, since he goes unmentioned after his defeat by Luthien and Huan until the end of the First Age.

I'm not sure about a rivalry between Sauron and Gothmog, since it keeps me thinking too much of Ebony Maw and Cull Obsidian in Avengers: Infinity War, where Ebony Maw abandons Cull Obsidian mid-battle just so he can grab an Infinity Stone for himself.
 
We built up their antagonism throughout Season 2; we will need to have some sort of payout for that. Gothmog dies in Gondolin. So....we will need to work Sauron into that story somehow.

I recognize that Tolkien did not write about First Age Sauron outside of the Beren and Lúthien story, but obviously he's around, so...we can incorporate him somewhere.
 
We built up their antagonism throughout Season 2; we will need to have some sort of payout for that. Gothmog dies in Gondolin. So....we will need to work Sauron into that story somehow.

I recognize that Tolkien did not write about First Age Sauron outside of the Beren and Lúthien story, but obviously he's around, so...we can incorporate him somewhere.
Don't know how to proceed with this, considering there doesn't seem to be a rivalry between Sauron and Gothmog in the published Silmarillion. Maybe Sauron complicates the actual assault by sabotaging the siege weapons, which indirectly allows the refugees to escape? I don't know.

But we should definitely write something for Sauron post Beren and Luthien, because it just looks like he's chilling in Taur-nu-Fuin after that point.
 
I can see gothmog and sauron competing for melkor's favor, but going as far as actively sabotaging the other... i don't know, that would come out as sabotaging melkor himself and i doubt any of both would be willing to take that risk, they should be realistic and pragmatic enough to see such a thing would be a waste and danger.
 
Last edited:
Don't know how to proceed with this, considering there doesn't seem to be a rivalry between Sauron and Gothmog in the published Silmarillion. Maybe Sauron complicates the actual assault by sabotaging the siege weapons, which indirectly allows the refugees to escape? I don't know.

But we should definitely write something for Sauron post Beren and Luthien, because it just looks like he's chilling in Taur-nu-Fuin after that point.


My suggestion has been and remains to be based upon the fact that in all of the Legendarium, attention is drawn to three balrog slayings. All three of the slayers possessed weapons forged in Gondolin. My assertion is that this is no accident, and that the Gondolindrim possessed some method of making weapons that would at least make the balrogs vulnerable (just as the Westernesse would one day make daggers which would make the Nazgul vulnerable even to mundane weapons).

Sauron could convey that method to them through Maeglin without actually damaging Melkor's efforts materially. The besieging army could be strong enough to take the city with or without the balrogs.
 
My problem with that idea is that slaying balrogs is not a matter of technology, those weapons are made out of deep insight, which is elven magic, they are in a way "blessed" , and such knowledge could nor come from sauron, or it would be flawed in some way.

Think about the rings of power...
 
The Rings of power actually are a better supporting example for what I mean. The three elvish Rings could not have been made without Sauron's input, but he had no hand in their actual manufacture. Thus the elves were able to use them without corrupting themselves.
 
I do not get your point here, the elves actually were not able to use or wear the rings without getting corrupted as long as sauron had the one. They only could make use of them as long as the one was lost or at least not in saurons hands... i dont't see how that logic would work with magic swords which slay balrogs..
 
I do not get your point here, the elves actually were not able to use or wear the rings without getting corrupted as long as sauron had the one. They only could make use of them as long as the one was lost or at least not in saurons hands... i dont't see how that logic would work with magic swords which slay balrogs..

The One Ring was different in that it was specifically able to communicate with the other 20. The fact that Sauron possesses the Nine did not prevent the Elves from using the Three, so unless Sauron goes out and builds a Master Sword, the elves would be alright to use weapons using techniques Sauron leaked to them.

In S02, we had Melkor helping the Noldor to make weapons, so I'm not entirely certain why this would be different.
 
The One Ring was different in that it was specifically able to communicate with the other 20. The fact that Sauron possesses the Nine did not prevent the Elves from using the Three, so unless Sauron goes out and builds a Master Sword, the elves would be alright to use weapons using techniques Sauron leaked to them.

In S02, we had Melkor helping the Noldor to make weapons, so I'm not entirely certain why this would be different.
Well, we have only one sword actively playing a part in slaying a Balrog, and that is Glamdring. Ecthelion killed Gothmog with the spike on his helmet.

I have an idea: maybe Sauron’s work with the swords gives him an idea to make a master ring (the One Ring)?...
 
Back
Top