The Problem With Galadriel and Rings of Power

Funnily enough, one simple fix would be to change the lesson her brother gives her to one fitting Tolkien’s idea of virtue. He tells her that evil corrupts and she, perhaps as a cop out, could argue that you need to touch the darkness to see the light. Then every time she fails at redemption, you can literally play that scene again and show her going against her brother’s lesson, because she’s not there yet. The audience understands she’s still in her downwards spiral. The problem I think is the writers aren’t really sure when to challenge Galadriel on her darkness and when to just glorify it as some element that makes her "badass" and "cool" or deep or some silly notion like that.

Galadriel is literally older than the sun. It makes zero sense for her to act like a child who hates everyone because she can't get her way.

Every time someone disagrees with Galadriel she pulls a knife and threatens to kill them. What a piece of work.

In Tolkien's actual work, Finrod (Galadriel's brother) was also a virtuous character. He died, not hunting Sauron as the show claims, but saving a human warrior named Beren who was was bound to by an oath. His virtue allowed him to be resurrected and given a new body in Valinor shortly after his death, instead of of his soul spending centuries in the Halls of Mandos, which was basically Tolkien's version of purgatory.

This show actually has me rooting for Sauron. The freaking DARK LORD SAURON!!

Why would Galadriel seek vengeance for her brother if elves don't die but go to the halls of Mandos? So she would've met her brother if she kept on sailing.

Galadriel was already ancient during the Second Age: She was taught by the Valar themselves, she was already wise and highly intelligent before Sauron began to make his move.

I haven't watched this and don't plan to, but what I absolutely CANNOT tolerate is Galadriel and everyone else surviving a pyroclastic flow without even asspulling magic. They are ALL DEAD.

Adar's interrogation was the only scene that made me feel sympathetic with a character, and that character was definitely not Galadriel (it also helps that Joseph Mawle is the only cast member in this show who CAN act).

The fact that as we’re moving forward, the heroes are becoming more villainous while the villains are becoming increasingly heroic and sympathetic, is rather telling about the mindset of those who are writing these things. It’s not just here, I’m seeing it with other stories as well.

what's strange to me is they bet her entire character on aggression, yet she's only in one real fight in the entire series, and it happens in episode 1. and her not telling anyone about Sauron was the dumbest moment in the whole show. and this show had a lot of dumb moments

One of the many sins of RoP: being brutally unfair to the character of Finrod.

When evil people try to make a story of good and evil, you get this.

I love how you focused on how the dagger actually runs counter to what the showrunners said about it recently; they claimed that her relinquishing the dagger showed her losing her childhood innocence (!), of all things.

Guy.ladriel is a projection of the showrunners, manipulative, power hungry, deceptive, insatiable.

This show fails on so many levels, but Gladriel's treatment might be the worst.

I think Disparu summerised her arch the best when he said she started as a cow and at the end she's still a cow.

Excellent breakdown, essentially the show took the principles that make up Tolkienian ethics and corrupted them. If you remove Tolkien from lotr you are only left with a parody, a shadow, of the grandeur that we all love.

It's amazing that while this show failed to make a likable flaw character, an other show about dragons had a lot of captivating, flawed characters. It's all about talent in writing.

The truth is that we, as a contemporary culture, do not know how to create a good hero. We’ve diluted the heroic archetype with so much gray. For us, creating a hero that we can be collectively inspired by is an awkward and arduous process that results in emo, confused, and almost depressed character; a representation of our collective modern psyche.