Session 4.03 - Frame Narrative for Season 4

We’ve used the frame in a couple of ways, moving from a storyteller model to a frame that is a mirror or set in contrast to the main story. The first model tends to become a kind of children’s book presentation which I think most of us want to avoid. The second type is more difficult though. If it is very dramatic, it risks stealing focus from the main story or making things confusing, and a less dramatic frame could feel boring. A hobbit frame runs the risk of becoming a bit silly, perhaps, although it also has the best potential to connect to viewers. All things considered, I think a Mirkwood frame sounds really good. It would be interesting while not too action filled, and we could mix parallels with direct reference to the main story or even narration if possible.
 
Does this board give mods or admins the power to move posts from one thread to another? A forum I once sub-moded for had that feature. It really helped when there was an accidental derail.

BTW sorry for derailing.
 
Oh, no worries, you didn't start the derailing, and I only noticed it once I started getting confused which thread I was replying to.

I think we have that option here? I dunno. I could try to figure it out. If so, yeah, I'll just move some posts around to keep the place neat and tidy.

As to the actual topics of this thread, I think that I want to hold the Hosts to discussing each episode individually. We can have some 'storyline' sessions before getting to that if they feel we need them, and we can inevitably do some backtracking as we go through and realize we need to tell another piece of a certain thread before getting to that scene in the episode at hand.

I think the issue here is that we're trying to tell some stories this season that we haven't invented yet - the dwarf storyline, Eöl's backstory, Lúthien's bff relationship with Galadriel, Galadriel's romance with Celeborn, the villains' plans, what have you. So, since we don't know what's going on...it's hard to plan :p We've had suggestions for all of those, of course, and started the relevant discussions....but it hasn't all come together yet. So, our episode plans are more backdrops...and we need to fill in the story for each one.
 
Also - should we approach this season Episode by Episode, or should the sessions focus on storylines individually rather than determining what happens in each episode?


I just got a chance to finish listening to last session, and I suggested to Prof. Olsen that we divide the season into three four-episode acts (leaving the finale as a separate thing) and going over the individual storylines in each before deciding how to divide the events into episodes, much as we did with the last few episodes of last season when discussing script outlines. This would give more flexibility than going episode by episode, while still allowing us some time to outline the individual episodes.
 
Seems sensible and fitting. Would we have three frame narrators or one? If three, I would think they ought to be together, not bouncing all over settings in Middle-earth.
 
Seems sensible and fitting. Would we have three frame narrators or one? If three, I would think they ought to be together, not bouncing all over settings in Middle-earth.

I don't think separate frame narratives or speakers would be necessary, but it is a possible option.
 
We have not chosen the Frame yet, so maybe none :p
Well, a few weeks ago, Haakon, Nick and I were in the “Thoughts on the casting process and how it could be improved” thread and were trying to think of a role for Maisie Williams that we wouldn’t have to make up and the best any of us could come up with was Lobelia Sackville-Baggins.

As for how the villains learn of the Kinslaying, couldn’t Sauron or Thurwingwethil just do some spying around during the Feast and afterward, take another form of a Sinda or two and then spread word from there? The text indicates that the rumors of the Kinslaying begin amongst the Sindar, and Cirdan sends word to Thingol.
 
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For anyone looking for the discussion on Rog, Ecthelion, Orodreth, and the release of captive elves from Angband, it can be found in the Episode Outline thread:

https://forums.signumuniversity.org/index.php?threads/session-4-02-season-4-episode-outlines.3019

Sorry for any confusion this has caused.

(In other news, I have figured out how to move individual posts to different threads, so hopefully I can try to keep our conversations organized moving forward should the need arise.)

On a similar note - please keep casting discussions in the casting forums.
 
The last part of The Hobbit has Gandalf and Balin visiting Bilbo seven years after Bilbo's return. Maybe Bilbo goes to Erebor with Gandalf and Balin, with a stopover in Rivendell where he meets Aragorn?
 
The question of whether or not to include Bilbo in this Frame was raised during today's session. I know it's fun to be all Bilbo!! about it, but of course we'd only include him if he played a significant role.

We do, however, need a character to be pushing for peace and forgiveness, and that was Bilbo's role in the Battle of Five Armies. He was literally asking them, 'Can't we all get along?' and trying to prevent them from fighting each other. So, if he returned on a 7-year-memorial, he'd want to see his old friends...getting along. If there were residual bad feelings, he'd want to root that out.

So, in some ways, he'd be the perfect catalyst for the types of rebuilding that we're trying to do here.
 
The question of whether or not to include Bilbo in this Frame was raised during today's session. I know it's fun to be all Bilbo!! about it, but of course we'd only include him if he played a significant role.

We do, however, need a character to be pushing for peace and forgiveness, and that was Bilbo's role in the Battle of Five Armies. He was literally asking them, 'Can't we all get along?' and trying to prevent them from fighting each other. So, if he returned on a 7-year-memorial, he'd want to see his old friends...getting along. If there were residual bad feelings, he'd want to root that out.

So, in some ways, he'd be the perfect catalyst for the types of rebuilding that we're trying to do here.
Plus, he’s a relatively neutral party since Hobbits haven’t really been on the central stage. And he stole the Arkenstone as part of an attempt to avoid war.

So should Celeborn have a brother or a sister?
 
Celeborn canonically has a brother, but I think it's very implausible for him to survive the fall of Doriath. Nimloth was either Celeborn's sister, or his neice, but she died in the First Age. So... for the frame, the plausble option would be to invent a different sister (who isn't Nimloth).

Bilbo visiting Erebor would be an occasion for him to try to nearby prod wood-elves into treating civilly with Dwarves. If Thranduil isn't willing to behave himself, Legolas presumably would be less of a jerk, even if he has some character development in store before the LotR starts.

Should Legolas be in need of character development/non-racism training?
 
It came up in the session, but it would be a pretty reasonable (and satisfying) solution to have a sister of Celeborn be Nimloth's mother, and survive into the Third Age as a senior member of Thranduil's court. This could either be in addition to, or in place of, the very casually mentioned sort-of canonical brother
 
I disgree. Replacing/sex-changing Galathil is unnecessary and will probably cause a plot hole in the future.

I'm not on board with changing Galathil's gender. I acknowledge that he's an obscure and undescribed character, but that's not necessary. Instead we should just give Celeborn a separate sister with a fittingly-tree-ish name. Galadlos or Faenorn or Celeblos, or something more clever. There's no reason he can't have an additional sibling.

More importantly than Galathil's gender, it's weird and maybe irresponsible if the parents of Nimloth are still alive after the Third Kinslaying, living on the Isle of Balar a few miles away from their orphaned twin great-grandsons, and not trying to regain the boys. (We would have to explain why they not only weren't sent to their relatives by supposedly contrite and well-meaning Feanorians, but also why they implausibly chose to stay with the Feanorians instead of rejoining their surviving family.) Or if Nimloth's parents leave and go east across the mountains before the Second Kinslaying, why leave their daughter, and never meet their grandchildren?
I'm not comfortable, as a writer, with changing an already awkward trans-racial fosterage story to one in which the boys who were violently abducted during a Kinslaying just happily, voluntarily, spend their entire childhood with the sons of Feanor even though their own great-grandparents are alive and well just a few miles away on the other side of the Isle of Balar. Especially not after reading and watching the adoption and trans-racial adoption documentaries during my company's recent Adoption Week. I was moved by those documentaries. Even adoptees who are abandoned at birth and adopted as infants by normal non-murderers of the same race as themselves, are often dissatisfied, grieve for the families they never met, and try to reconnect with their birth families even in childhood and adolescence.

Elwing's sons are said to have stayed voluntarily, not as prisoners, and to have come to love their foster-father. I don't want to be put in a position where I have to write that story falsely, or in a way that insults real adopted children's experiences. And I like that story quite a lot, I don't want to have to change it to the boys being miserable or prisoners.

And as always, I will point out when a change is unnecessary. We can very easily give Celeborn a sister who is entirely separate from the canon character Galathil.
 
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Other than existing and having a name, does the brother of Celeborn ever do anything (it's been a while)? Is there a reason that this character (whether brother or sister) can't head off over into Eriador with G and C (and their followers, see my other post about naming conventions haha) and not be nearby villainously avoiding raising their descendants on the Isle of Balar?
 
What would be the problem of inventing a new name?Maybe one would one day find 6se for Galathil elsewhere, you never know...
 
Galathil only appears in the genealogies. Tolkien never rewrote the Fall of Doriath after the Lost Tales, so we don't know what Galathil, Celeborn, or Galadriel were doing during it.

Is there a reason that this character (whether brother or sister) can't head off over into Eriador with G and C (and their followers, see my other post about naming conventions haha)
That would be much more plausible, and not an uncomfortable prospect to write it. I'm not against a sister going east with Celeborn.

But is there any reason that Celeborn's sister can't be a separate person from Galathil-father-of-Nimloth? Is there a reason Celeborn must not have a brother?

Killing off Celeborn's father and brother/sibling in Doriath, at Dwarven hands, would help explain Celeborn's 6400-year-long racism against Dwarves.

Again... sex-changing a very obscure character bothers me a lot less than giving up on the stories Galathil could be used for, if he were a separate character. We can have our cake and eat it too... by giving Celeborn 2 siblings. Both sisters, if you want.
 
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This sibling of Celeborn's is meant to be with the Green Elves in Ossiriand, not in Doriath. And this elf would then travel east of the mountains with Oropher (not with Galadriel and Celeborn).

One reason to stick with 'sister' is to have a very default reason why she is not with Celeborn - she has married an elf among the Laiquendi, and thus joined them. It's understood that wives become part of the people they marry into in these stories, so such a story would 'fit'.

I'm really not sure we want to make this elder of Mirkwood a female elf just for the fun of it, but there's no reason she can't be female. We were going to have a long-lived female mentor-type character in the Season 2 frame, and then we re-wrote the character as a much younger contemporary of Arwen's. So, we could revisit that impulse here and see if it works better with the Season 4 frame. Or, if not...we can keep it as Celeborn's brother, and come up with some other reason why Celeborn has been with Elwë while his brother stuck with Lenwë. (Recall that Elwë personally saved young Celeborn from the Hunter, so Celeborn's loyalty is not an issue here.)

I don't think we are changing the story when there is no story to change. Galathil is a name on a family tree. Sure, Tolkien may have given him a unique story if he'd ever gotten around to writing the fall of Doriath...but he didn't. There's not really any reason we can't rename this character Galathiliel (or whatever) and make her Celeborn's sister and Nimloth's mother. Doesn't mean that we have to or that we should, but we could, and I don't think it would cause any problems. As for the question of adoption; this character can depart Beleriand over the mountains before Elrond and Elros are even born. No reason for them to be on Balar or in contact with any of the elves of Beleriand.
 
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