Dwarves: S3 and beyond

amysrevenge

amysrevenge

Well-Known Member
This has been percolating around a bit, and it's probably actually the correct time to talk about it so we can have a plan moving in to S3.

Whither Dwarves?

If we follow the PubSil, we allllmost don't need Dwarves at all. The creation story in S1. In S3 Eol visits them for a millisecond, they help construct Menegroth, there's a minor cameo for some Dragonslaying in one battle, then much later on in S6 or beyond Mim curses Turin, and spurned Dwarves sack Menegroth.

That's about it, and almost all of that, if we wanted to, could be cut without losing any threads of plot.

But I, for one, don't want to cut even a second of it. I want to blow it up.

I want a 5-episode arc of wholly created-by-us internal Dwarf stories in S4 (or S5, if we end up splitting the planned S4). I want the arrival of Dwarves in S3 to be more than a "oh hey it's Dwarves see ya later" footnote.

So, basically, we need to decide how much we will be increasing the prominence and involvement of Dwarves in S4 and beyond, in order to properly set them up in S3 now. We don't have to work out any but the broadest details for later.
 
Oh, definitely. I want Telchar to get a fair bit of screentime, with sufficent weight given to Narsil, Angrist, and the Dragon-helm's crafting.

The story will, I think, remain an elf-centric story, but we have so much we can play with here.
 
An idea for a future Dwarf plotline: the debate between isolationists and interventionists within the Dwarf communities. Do they want to get involved in the politics and economy of Beleriand, or do they shut their doors to the West and keep to themselves? I think the "bad" faction should be the isolationist one, and they ultimately win in Beleriand, so that later (so very much later) when the other guys win in Hollin with Celebrimbor it is satsifying.

We can even have Sauron involved with the isolationists - it is surely to Morgoth's advantage to not have a full partnership form between Dwarves and Elves.
 
Ok, so there are a few ways to play Dwarves:

We could only show them in the ways they interact with Men and Elves.

We can show their story concurrently with that of everyone else's as it relates to the other plot elements.

We do a separate show just for the dwarves and connect it to the main SilmFilm show CW Superhero style.

Of course, I'm sure there are others, but these are what I came up with on the fly.
 
Yes, those are the options (I honestly hadn't considered the third, but I like it as an option).

I prefer the second, but that involves probably our largest whole-cloth creation to date. There just isn't the extant material to draw from. It's a new mode for the project, where we go all the way off the rails in a major way. Which I think we're eventually going to have to do anyway in other contexts (thinking of the adventures of the houses of the Edain here, among others).
 
Nicholas Palazzo said:
Ok, so there are a few ways to play Dwarves:

We could only show them in the ways they interact with Men and Elves.

We can show their story concurrently with that of everyone else's as it relates to the other plot elements.

We do a separate show just for the dwarves and connect it to the main SilmFilm show CW Superhero style.

Of course, I'm sure there are others, but these are what I came up with on the fly.
Click to expand...
In an ideal world, I'd go with #3, but goodness would be a lot more work... I'm actually leaning towards #1. I hate to say it, but SilmFilm can't do everything, and if forced to choose, I'd rather we tell the Elf Story really, really well than tell everyone's story just okay.
 
Well, we are going to get a lot more dwarf story in the second and third age, but I agree that giving them more material in the First Age would be better so that we don't lose track of them.

Marielle said:
In an ideal world, I'd go with #3, but goodness would be a lot more work... I'm actually leaning towards #1. I hate to say it, but SilmFilm can't do everything, and if forced to choose, I'd rather we tell the Elf Story really, really well than tell everyone's story just okay.
Click to expand...

Honestly, if we take enough time to do it, I'm not really sure why we can't tell stories other than those of the Elves without resorting to "just okay"?

I mean, I understand that the Elves are pretty, but that's no reason that we should be anti-Dwarf. ;)
 
I agree that I would like to see some dwarf-centric story lines.

We created some storylines from whole cloth for Season 1 - Manwë's visit to Utumno and Nessa's capture by Ungoliant, for instance, were *not* written by Tolkien in any form. Season 3 will be tighter to 'Tolkien wrote this, so we will do this' because we are dealing with a pivotal part of the story of the Noldor. So, there's room for nuance and storytelling and adding details, but the framework is already set.

The dwarf storyline (and part of the Doriath storyline) is our opportunity to be creative and come up with our own material in this season. It will be good practice for Season 4.
 
I'm pro Dwarf. I love Dwarves.

But I'm not sure I want to show too much of them. I don't want to take away the mystery.
 
Nicholas Palazzo said:
Well, we are going to get a lot more dwarf story in the second and third age, but I agree that giving them more material in the First Age would be better so that we don't lose track of them.



Honestly, if we take enough time to do it, I'm not really sure why we can't tell stories other than those of the Elves without resorting to "just okay"?

I mean, I understand that the Elves are pretty, but that's no reason that we should be anti-Dwarf. ;)
Click to expand...
I am not anti-dwarf! :eek:

More seriously, it's a question of how many balls we want to juggle. If there was one elf story, one man story, one dwarf story, then yes, definitely have as much dwarrow stuff as possible. But the elf story is going to fracture, as is the man, and at least those two races constantly intersect with each other. Any dwarf story is going to be largely independent, which means taking time out of episodes to give unrelated content (that we'll largely have to create). If we can create parallel/linked stories, either with characters or themes, without getting too formulaic or hooky, then I'm all for it.

Also, going along with Haakon, our frame characters likely don't know many dwarf-stories. They're secretive, and we shouldn't overlook that.
 
Mid-S4 break. Pause the frame, pause the Elves in Beleriand story. Have a mini-series, maybe 3-5 episodes, with a new frame of their own. Gandalf and Balin visiting Bilbo post-Battle of Five Armies. Balin tells stories that the Dwarves still remember about the 1st Age.

This could then be a nice precedent for other similar breaks. In the 2nd Age, pause the Numenor story with a limited-run "meanwhile back on the mainland" mini-series. In the 3rd age, pause the grander story with a "hey, Hobbits just crossed the Baranduin" mini-series. That sort of thing.
 
I like story arcs that run for multiple episodes. The idea of having to neatly wrap up a story each episode in a non-episodic TV show is annoying. It's a series; it's allowed to introduce storylines that aren't solved right away.

However, I'm not so sure about the idea of ditching our main storyline for a few episodes to do side stories. It's one thing to do a 'Meanwhile in Beleriand' Sindarin arc that way, because Doriath will be our main story for some storylines. Our 'Meanwhile in Angband' scenes are just that - scenes we cut to to advance that side story in the midst of a main storyline about elves.

It's the Silmarillion - it's the history of the Elves. It's going to stay elf-centric. We can beef up the roles of side storylines, but not at the expense of the main storyline. Only if we can tie them in. That was the point of coming up with the anti-balrog technology idea for Gondolin. It gives Sauron an angle for something specific he's trying to get out of Maeglin's capture, and gives us a pay off for the Gothmog/Sauron rivalry we've established. We had to tie-in to the fall of Gondolin story directly for that to work.

Likewise, we will have to tie Men into the story of the Elves (not hard) and dwarves (harder) and ents (okay, very hard, but at least we don't need them often).
 
Generating interest for things the audience doesn't know yet is an important way to get fans invested in a show. That's why you don't start with the 'backstory' episode. You introduce all your characters, show the dynamics of how they work together and what they are doing, and then start dropping hints about their history.

Eventually, there's a 'how they met' episode where some characters sit around reminiscing over the past (or something) to show what led up to the current day state of affairs. 'Out of Gas' is the mid-season episode on Firefly, but usually these aren't 1st season episodes. You have a lot more build-up and teasing before you get to that, because the audience has to be curious. You teach the audience what questions to have before you reveal the answers (ie, what was Shepherd Book's backstory?). Or, you wait until you kill one of the characters off, and then this is essentially a wake memorializing them (methinks we'll have opportunities for some of that here!)

Of course, if you tease the reveal for your entire series a la How I Met Your Mother, then you are just being a jerk and trolling your audience. That's not a good way of storytelling either.

We'll have to maintain some mystery with the dwarves, and keep the audience hungry for scraps that we dole out very sparingly. But having some dwarvish characters talking together about secrets that they must never reveal to the elves should definitely happen at some point! The mortality of dwarves is difficult, but we can do some 'Gimli son of Gloin' stuff for continuity. The king of Nogrod can always take the same name or something. We'll make it work.
 
Last edited:
We could introduce the Dwarves gradually, and have them be a group more than individuals to begin with. Perhaps the Elves won't really be able to tell the difference between them, and if so, we could wait an episode ore more before introducing the first prominent Dwarf/Dwarves. This could be because of the secrecy of the Dwarves as well. It could be a good tease for the viewers.
 
MithLuin said:
The mortality of dwarves is difficult, but we can do some 'Gimli son of Gloin' stuff for continuity. The king of Nogrod can always take the same name or something. We'll make it work.
Click to expand...

Perhaps Durin is not the only founding Dwarf to be reborn for generations.
 
i already wrote a bit about the topic in the other dwarf (casting) threat...

there's a bit dwsrf action we could easily flesh out:
-dwarves make contact with the sindar
-dwarves trade weapons to the sindar
-dwarves trade weapons to morgith/orcs
-dwarves help built menegroth
-dwarves battle remnants of orc host at mt dolmed
-petty dwarves arrive in beleriand
-petty dwarves driven out of sharbhund
-dwarves help make nargithrond
-dwarves negotiate with caranthir
-dwarves make friends with eol
-dwarves join uniin of maedhros
-azaghal battles glaurung
-telchar makes dragonhelm, angrist&narsil
-mim&turin
-dwarves and nauglamir
-dwarves do something in war of wrath?


personally im voting for expanding the roleof gamil zirak to make him a main dwsrven protagonist for the earlier years and after that shifting to telchar to represent the dwarves symbolically..
 
Season 3:
We need to show that the dwarves are a very secret people. At first the Sindar are hunting them because they think dwarves are animals. They have never seen anything like them before. The dwarves afterwards established contacts with Doriath to stop the hunting, but no one tell where they come from. Maybe some sindar go to visit Nogrod and help them to decorate it or something. In Nogrod they meet the king(?) and Gamil Zirak. The Sindar bring pearls and the dwarves help to build Menegroth. The dwarves don't speak their language to the elves or show their women and children. Maybe the viewers can see some hiding when the elves visit the dwarven cities.

Season 4:
Some dwarves are still mad at the elves and feel betrayed by their king, so they start planning "terrorist attacks" against the elf-supporters and the overthrow of the king. They capture an elf, but he has bad feelings for the other elves too. This elf is Eöl. Eöl joins them and they learn much from each other. Here we can learn where dwarves come from, the seven fathers and that they think Aulë is a god, Mahal. Their first king died long ago and they believe he is reborn in one of the "rebels". That's why they want to take the thrown, because the current king isn't one of the Seven reborn. When the pieces are set the Anti-elf dwarves start their attack. They kill Gamil Zirak because he support the king and trade with the Sindar. The rebels are exiled because of it. Gamil's aprentice, Telchar, takes over after Gamil is dead.

???
Do we need to follow the exiles to Nulukkizdîn, where they become the petty dwarves? And see the establishment of Nargothrond and that the dwarves are sent away?
Or do we reveal that the exiles established Nulukkizdîn and were sent away by the Noldor, when we meet Mîm in the Túrin season(s)?
I think the latter is better.

We need to make sure Nargothrond is established after the petty dwarves are exiled. Im not sure where the seasons start and stop, so if things I wrote need to be changed to fit the seasons (when Nargothrond is established) tell me.

These are just some ideas. I didn't want to have too much in each season, because this is not the main focus of the season and we don't want to take the focus away from the main story. We don't have too much time in each episode.
 
hmm... not sure about dwarves kidnspping eol, an outsider who is of little use for them, dwarves murder poor old gamil? please no.

we'd have to talk about that rebirth&reembodiment thing again..

do we make the petty dwsrves exiles from nogrod&belegost or from dwarven cities of the east (east like rhun)... the books are somewhat unclear about this.
 
I actually like a lot of those ideas (Alcarothar's) but I maintain that we should be restrictive about the dwarven story appearances. This is mainly the Elven story about the earliest times leading to the War of the Ring, and not a general presentation of everything that ever happens in Tolkien's world.
I think we should perhaps not show how Eöl befriended the Dwarves but maybe have a Doriath elf see him among the Dwarves on an occasion when the elves try to come to some sort of agreement with the Dwarves whom they have repeatedly been in conflict with. The elves are of course surprised, what is he doing with the Dwarves, and they acknowledge that Eöl is a friend.
(The question is, do we show Eöl in season 3, turning up in Thingol's realm and leaving again and setting up his own place? I think we should)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top