Script Discussion S04E09

*grumble, grumble* YouTube *grumble grumble* Google Hangouts *grumble grumble*

Also, all the grumbling about balrogs and Angrod!


SilmFilm S4Ep9: Dagor Aglareb Script Outline Notes

TEASER:
Dain visits Roac on Ravenhill. Roac reminisces about Dain's arrival at the Battle of Five Armies. They discuss Dain’s absence from the celebration. Roac says that if he won’t talk to the elves, nothing will be resolved.

Act I
  1. Cloud cover expands to cover Ard Galen. Earthquakes. Celegorm and Huan witness a large orc army lead by Boldog exiting the main gate of Angband. Celegorm gives instruction to the scouts with him to report the movements of the orc army regularly, and rides off in haste to alert his brothers.
  2. Establishing shot of Minas Tirith. Finrod watches in concern as the cloud of darkness rolls in. Orodreth has just arrived (reunited with his wife Meril). Finrod asks about his mother Edhellos. He says she’s well, but with reservations. Finrod suggests they need to give her time.
  3. Dorthonion - Angrod and Aegnor’s army is mobilized. Scouting party returns reporting orc skirmish, including size and direction of army. Edhellos is Angrod’s herald; Angrod tells her to send a messenger to Himring. Edhellos takes an extra aside, and rather than giving him a message, slays him. {Spell of Bottomless Dread special effects}
  4. Barad Eithel- Fingolfin has mustered his troops. He gets word of orc armies marching to Sirion. He leaves Aredhel and Rhogrin in Barad Eithel to protect Mithrim with a smaller force. Fingolfin and Fingon take the bulk of the army to attack the orcs.
  5. Nevrast - Turgon gives message to Galdor to Círdan attempting to reconcile after the Kinslaying reveal. Galdor doesn’t seem very certain, but leaves in a ship to tell Círdan. Nighttime. Messenger arrives from Fingolfin; an army of orcs is marching south from Thangorodrim. Please reinforce Finrod at Minas Tirith.
Act II

6. Orcs reach Minas Tirith. Finrod sends a messenger to Thingol in Doriath for aid. He trusts that Fingolfin and his watch towers are aware. The orcs are on the east bank. They besiege the bridge. Gatehouse in river’s stream. Finrod pulls up drawbridges. Orcs chop down trees to start trying to reach Tol Sirion.​
7. Angrod and Aegnor rendezvous with Fingolfin and Fingon south of the Fens of Serech. Exchange information on orc movements. Fingolfin shares he sent word to Turgon to protect southern Beleriand should the orcs break through. Angrod says he sent messenger to Maedhros with information on where the army is headed. March south on orc army.​
8. Turgon mobilizes. Glorfindel and Ecthelion bravado about being excited to have a chance to take part in a battle. Sitting in Vinyamar, they would never have a chance for such things. .​
9. Siege of Minas Tirith. Fingolfin’s forces come out of the forest and hit the orcs. Finrod lowers the drawbridge and sorties out.​

ACT III
10. Fingolfin and Finrod meet on the east bank of Sirion. Finrod says he sent a messenger to Doriath (not with much hope). They plan to pursue the routed orcs so Morgoth won’t dare do this again.​
11. Barad Eithel - Witness second army marching across Ard Galen. Aredhel and Rhogrin can’t abandon their post, but must warn Fingolfin. Aredhel wants to go, but Rhogrin argues that he knows the way. Rhogrin is making his way through the trees on the mountainside of Ered Wethrin. He is attacked by a giant cat.​
12. Pools of Ivrin - Turgon’s dream. Turgon enters the throne room of Vinyamar. It’s deserted and there are leaves blowing through it. {Tuor's viewpoint} He hears Elenwë calling him, “Come home! Come home!” The statue reaches for him. There is a pounding sound in the background throughout. The city is long deserted. There’s a battering ram at the gate.​
13. Fens of Serech - Second army led by Gothmog attacks Fingolfin’s army. They are pinned down.​

ACT IV

14. Massive casualties at Fens of Serech. Edhellos despairs. Angrod encourages her, no, help is on the way! Maedhros will come through. He has trust in the Fëanoreans now since Celebrimbor helped rescue her. Morgoth releases her, 'ungagging' her. She breaks down, a distraught confession of what Morgoth forced her to do. She rushes out into the battle without any weapons. Angrod tries to stop her, but can’t get to her in time. She runs into Gothmog, who smashes her. Nooooo!​
15. Vinyamar is under siege from an army of orcs. {Draugluin is leader} Turgon arrives and prepares to break the siege. He’s confident that he can handle this at first. But...the gates have been broken through, and the garrison he left behind is trying to hold them back from entering the city, but won’t last much longer.​
16. Angrod, enraged, kills a troll to get to Gothmog. Gothmog wounds Angrod mortally. Aegnor and other elves come to Angrod’s defense; Gothmog breaks Aegnor’s sword. The trolls close ranks and Gothmog retreats. Angrod, dying, tells Aegnor of Edhellos’ treachery as Aegnor berates him for dying.​
17. Aegnor tells Fingolfin that no messenger reached Maedhros. Fingolfin reveals that he’s had a messenger that Turgon isn’t coming. Suddenly, Celegorm arrives! His cavalry beats back the orc army, forcing them into the swords and spears of Maedhros’ foot soldiers.​
18. {Intercut with 17} Círdan’s ships arrive from the north! Their archers help mow down the orcs at the gate. Silent montage moments of the aftermath of both battles. Turgon and Círdan greet one another after the orcs are dead. In the Fens of Serech, Aegnor kneels mourning for Angrod and Edhellos; Maedhros puts his stump on Aegnor’s shoulder.​
19. The balrogs and the remnants of their armies return to Angband. Rhogrin is revealed as a prisoner in Angband.​

TAG: Dain arrives in Dale in party clothes and with a smaller/less heavily armored entourage than before. Bard greets him warily. Dain assures him that he’s there in good faith.
 
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16. Angrod, enraged, kills a troll to get to Gothmog. Gothmog wounds Angrod mortally. Aegnor and other elves come to Angrod’s defense; Gothmog breaks Aegnor’s sword. The trolls close ranks and Gothmog retreats. Angrod, dying, tells Aegnor of Edhellos’ treachery as Aegnor berates him for dying.

Quick point of order, I would say that Angrod reveals that his messenger never reached Maedhros. Aegnor shouldn't know about Edhellos' treachery.
 
So... I'm having some trouble with the Skype video recording and may not be able to recover it. The good news is that I think I figured out how to stream it properly.
 
In the script discussion, we decided that there would be about 5,000 Noldor total for the main attack centered around Minas Tirith, but we didn't go into detail about how many belonged to each house or what the numbers of Orcs look like. My thoughts are to divide the Noldor up so that the Feanorians have 1,500 soldiers; Angrod and Aegnor together have 1,000; Finrod and Orodreth together have 1,000; and Fingon and Fingolfin together have 1,500. The Orcs and Trolls I thought could have 6,000 total soldiers, so they would outnumber the Noldor, with 2,500 in Boldog's army that attacks Minas Tirith and the other 3,500 in the army that meets the Noldor in the Fens of Serech.

Please let me know if these numbers seem unrealistic.
 
I think that's not enough Orcs by an order of magnitude, to face an entire army of Calaquendi with the light of Aman fresh in their eyes.
 
There are two armies of Orcs. The first one goes into the Pass of Sirion to attack Minas Tirith. The second and larger one comes up behind the armies of Fingolfin, Fingon, Angrod, and Aegnor and attacks them in the Fens of Serech. I'm not including the Orcs that sneak down the coast to attack Vinyamar in the count because I don't think I will need to refer to their numbers.
 
I would say that if we use the descriptions of what happens when the Noldor meet orcs early on, the army would have to number in the tens of thousands to pose a credible threat.
 
Is there anyone on scouting duties to state how many Orcs there are? We don’t want to fall into the trap of something like Game of Thrones where someone “forgets” about an entire fleet and didn’t scout for it. ;)
 
I don't know how to gauge actual numbers, but the terriblest Elf here is way tougher than the best Man at Helm's Deep or Pellenor Field.
 
I’m not really good at making these estimations (so perhaps I should stay away) but I just think about Legolas at Helm’s Deep, where he alone took over 40 orc lives. And he’s just a third age Mirkwood Sinda (a hero but still). Now I get that these things probably depend a lot on the specific circumstances of the battle - Legolas could shoot orcs from a safe place, especially in the beginning. This time, it’s different. The elves in FA Minas Tirith are going to be able to match more IRC’s because they’re behind walls. So that orc army should be great in order to pose a serious threat. But we’re saying the second orc army is even greater.
Do we think that 6 to 1 is enough of advantage for the orcs to defeat the defenders of Minas Tirith before the Feanorians show up?
So I guess I’m saying I don’t think six times the number of elves is enough. The first army should be perhaps ten times the number of elves. The second could be 1.5 times that number?
 
Most of the time the orcs lose 10 to 1... JRRT usually fails to explain why... because he NEvER portraits the orcs as useless goons like peter jackson did, he describes them as very capable, well trained, well equiped, disciplined soldiery.Yet they still almost always lose... even if they outnumber their enemies by far. I guess technically it's because... they're the bad guys so they just HAVE to lose, as unrealistic as it seems...

If i had to explain why i'd have to think of points such as

1 - they're slaves, their enemies are free, so the elves fight for a greater cause while the or s are driven to battle by the balrogs fiery whips...
2 - every elf is not only a free craftsman and artist but a very well equipped fully trained strong warrior
a lot of orcs are probably only not very good nurtured, under-trained war-slaves, we don't know how many of them are real soldier-orcs and how many are just randomly lift up miners and workers, but i guess it might be the bulk ofvthem
3 - the orcs may be well equipped by the demons of morgoth, but still... the noldor and dwarves are probably the best smiths ever in history so they are still superior equippped fighters
4 - faith. We should not underestimate this factor... the noldor may have left the valar behind, they may have done wrong in a lot of things, yet they still have a very strong faith, they know the valar, they k ow eru, they know mandos, they know their cosmology and fate.the orcs have nothing but their evil master whom they secretly hate but serve only out of fear...
 
I’m not really good at making these estimations (so perhaps I should stay away) but I just think about Legolas at Helm’s Deep, where he alone took over 40 orc lives. And he’s just a third age Mirkwood Sinda (a hero but still). Now I get that these things probably depend a lot on the specific circumstances of the battle - Legolas could shoot orcs from a safe place, especially in the beginning. This time, it’s different. The elves in FA Minas Tirith are going to be able to match more IRC’s because they’re behind walls. So that orc army should be great in order to pose a serious threat. But we’re saying the second orc army is even greater.

So I guess I’m saying I don’t think six times the number of elves is enough. The first army should be perhaps ten times the number of elves. The second could be 1.5 times that number?
So how many Elves will be present?
 
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