Over the past few weeks, a ton of leaks have come out about The Lord of the Rings on Prime
TV series, some frustrating, some enlightening, some confusing, aaand some black Hobbits-
and this video covers more or less ten of them.
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So, about a week ago TheOneRing.Net released 20 leaks, and Fellowship of Fans not too long
before also released a few things. TheOneRing.Net reported some things like [1] the Unfinished
Tales and The Silmarillion being confirmed as sources for the show for the first time
ever, [2] Sir Lenny Henry being a Hobbit, [3] Elves having short hair, and a lot of
other things that I could pick apart rather easily. Starting from the top, their first
point is really deceptive. I’ve been telling people for months that they’re using parts
of the Silmarillion and The Unfinished Tales for the show. We know this because there’s
a lot of pertinent information in the Silmarillion which they will have to use for the show,
and the Unfinished Tales contains the description of Numenor, which they needed to be allowed
to map its regions. Dropping any semblance of eloquence I might usually try to employ,
what is the OneRing they even doing? That’s rhetorical, but they need to shape up and
stop being pretentious.
Their second point isn’t as deceptive, but it’s very confusing.
They’ve previously speculated Sir Lenny Henry could be a Wizard, then a Dwarf, and
now a Hobbit, and have really given such a huge amount of rumor, a term they use synonymously
with speculation, that it’s hard to trust them at all. They’ve said James Horner,
who died in 2015, was talking about composing for Amazon, and they’ve also said they were
90% sure Russel Crowe was involved in the series, which he is not. Furthermore, Hobbits
were not black and were not written into the Second Age- despite what they’ve said. I
could say more, but the thing I’m getting at is that I simply don’t trust them anymore.
They were probably a good source for the Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit back in the day,
but they’ve completely lost my respect for one, and my trust for another. Maybe in the
end we’ll see they were right about a few things, but to be honest, they’ve rumored,
speculated, or guessed about a huge amount of things without proof of confirmation, they’re
bound to get something right, in some way. Finally, even at the time of writing this
script, not a week after they came out with their list of 20 leaks, it seems as though
they’re already going to recant part of what they’ve said- supposedly the information
about Elves with short hair and Trolls being called Ice Trolls to avoid copyright issues
with Warner Bros. What else is wrong? I’ve also heard that the black Hobbit could also
be short Dunlending instead- something which I’ve been told was said as a disclaimer
on TORn’s stream- but whether or not that’s true, I can’t be bothered to check [BLACK]
I mean, what do you expect, quality content? You know you should be expecting Celebrimbor
propaganda. Just kidding, I tried checking the transcript, but couldn’t find it, and
can’t really spend over two hours watching the full stream.
If I could give a little bit of advice to whoever owns TheOneRing.Net, it’s this:
get rid of or reassign whoever operates your social media accounts, stop getting political,
and only release leaks that you know to be one hundred percent true. After all, you probably
receive a ton of random or fake rumors/leaks made up by random people, which are entirely
unreliable. Seriously, the last thing I want to do is attack you, but I think these changes
could truly help them out.
Now, onto the rest of the list:
4. Kip Chapman’s character will be called Selin
Really not much can be said about this. I could speculate about what kind of name this
is, but I doubt I’d get anywhere.
5. This next point is paraphrased directly from Fellowship of Fan’s source on the set
of the show, mostly edited to sounds betterer, and don’t mind me if I read it slow to make
the video longer:
There are different guilds in Numenor, like the blacksmith’s guild, Fisherman’s guild,
bread maker’s guild, builder’s guild, and so on and so forth. Each guild has its
own different insignia, and most of the extras on the set belong to one of the guilds. Each
of them has a guild seal somewhere on their costume: sometimes on the belt, sometimes
on the shoulder. It looks like a small golden coin, but with their guild insignia. If you
are a blacksmith guild extra, your guild insignia is a hammer and tong inside a burst of flame.
When the army is marching out of the town square you will see a Numenorean general wearing
his armor, it’s a gold chest piece with all the guild seals represented on the front
of his armor.
The guild insignias seem to point to continuity with Peter Jackson's trilogy as much as continuity
with the actual canon. During the crowning of Elessar (or Aragorn), you can see what
appears to be a fish-scale design on the front, back and sides of the crown, a reference to
the seafaring Island Kingdom of Numenor, which this series will be exploring, apparently
a lot. The same can be said of Elendil and Isildur in the intro of the trilogy. It’s
pretty fishy that Numenor is this involved with season one, but it’s something we know
for quite a few reasons, like some that I mentioned a couple of videos ago. You can
click the card at the top of the screen now to watch that, but if you don’t want to,
just get ready to see a Numenoreans Queen’s Throne Room, Anthony Crum trying to join a
Numenorean Army, and a Numenorean Town square. There’s also a mention of Numenor in the
synopsis and in the channel banner of the show’s social media accounts, but that’s
less important than actual story leaks. To clarify, the fact that we’ve got story leaks
about Numenor doesn’t mean Numenor will be overinvolved, but the fact that we’ve
only got story leaks about Numenor does. Still, maybe that’s just a coincidence. [WHISPER]
It’s not.
As for the Numenorean general seen wearing each of the guild insignias, we can only guess
who he is, and my guess is the Numenorean general, or rather admiral, Ciryatur. Ciryatur
was the admiral of Numenor’s fleets sent by Tar-Minastir to help the Elves in their
time of need when Sauron was just about to defeat the forces of Gil-galad at the river
Lhun. These Numenorean fleets came at the behest of Gil-galad, High King of the Elves,
who sent a request for help five years before, in the year 1695, to the King of Numenor,
Tar-Minastir, who I’ve already mentioned, but c’mon, the video has got to be at least
ten minutes long. So, the forces arrived five years after the first call for help, but also
in the knick of time, when Gil-galad’s forces were about to lose one of the last footholds
in Eriador, and one that defended the Elf-kingdom of Lindon. At that river, the river Lhun,
the forces of Sauron suffered a horrible defeat, because of the fleet of Ciryatur, which reinforced
the Elves and a small amount of Numenoreans holding him off. Sauron retreated southeast
to the Brandywine, more specifically the crossing of Sarn Ford. There he was defeated again,
retreating further eastwards. Once he reached Tharbad, he was heavily reinforced, but this
too was short-lived. Still being pursued by the forces from Lindon alongside their Numenorean
reinforcements, he was met from behind by the other half of Ciryatur’s fleet. This
happened near the Numenorean settlement of Lond Daer on the river Gwathlo, which had
been established under a different name long ago by king Aldarion. Although we really don’t
know much about Ciryatan, we can assume because of this that he was a competent strategist.
Seriously, and although this is a bit of a tangent and yes, I’m just saying this so
the video’s longer, Celebrimbor should be the main character of the series. He’s by
far the best candidate. But, I really digress, back to the story at hand. Ciryatur likely
sent this force of Numenoreans at or before the time when Sauron’s forces were first
pushed back at Lhun, but admittedly, the matter of when is somewhat irrelevant when admiring
his tactical genius. So, Sauron’s forces were defeated there, and escaped with nothing
but himself and a small bodyguard. This battle became known as the Battle of the Gwathlo,
and was a turning point in Sauron’s campaign to rule Middle-earth not only because it was
a major setback for him, but because it led to him wanting to corrupt Numenor itself,
which also led to him dying, well, [BLACK] only three times or so.
Now that you know more about the battle of the Gwathlo and the admiral Ciryatur, why
do I think he’s the best candidate for being this aforementioned general?
More or less because there aren’t any other Numenorean admirals mentioned in the lore,
and because of the distinctions between a king and a general and an admiral. An admiral
is very literally a general- just one of the seas, whereas a king is much different from
both, even if that role does share some similarities. Because it always happens, some people will
say this general could be Tar-Calion, the last king of Numenor, but it’s definitely
not, partially because of this distinction and partially because he’s only in the very
late Second Age, which will probably be season 4 or 5, 3 at the most unimaginable earliest,
but most definitely not seasons one. Even then it’s worth mentioning Ciryatan is only
seen in the year 1700 of the Second Age, which would be at least 500 years after the start
of the TV show, meaning he’s probably seen late season one. Lastly, I should say that
the battle of the Gwathlo is one of the first times Numenor was ever in true need of an
admiral and its army, so given that we see its army march through the town square, it’s
probably a safe bet to say we’ll see both the Battle of the Gwathlo and Ciryatur.
Something else to mention is that there are also a few Numenoreans guilds mentioned in
the actual lore, like the Guild of Weaponsmiths and Guild of Venturers. The Guild of Venturers
was a prestigious guild started by King Aldarion the mariner, which focused on, you guessed
it, venturing and sailing to Middle-Earth. It could be that this is the fisherman’s
guild mentioned in the leak, but even if it’s not, you can be sure we’ll see it in the
show. The same goes for the Guild of Weaponsmiths, which is probably the Guild of Blacksmiths
also mentioned in the leak. Something to note about the guild is that it was less prestigious
than the Guild of Venturers, mostly because weapons were never needed in Numenor, nor
were they needed in any large amount outside of Numenor until about halfway through the
Second Age. This is said in the Unfinished Tales:
“Swords the Guild of Weaponsmiths made, for the preservation of the craft, though
most of their labour was spent on the fashioning of tools for the uses of peace. The King and
most of the great chieftains possessed swords as heirlooms of their fathers; and at times
they would still give a sword as a gift to their heirs. A new sword was made for the
King's Heir to be given to him on the day on which this title was conferred. But no
man wore a sword in Númenor, and for long years few indeed were the weapons of warlike
intent that were made in the land. Axes and spears and bows they had, and shooting with
bows on foot and on horseback was a chief sport and pastime of the Númenóreans.
In later days, in the wars upon Middle-earth, it was the bows of the Númenóreans that
were most greatly feared. "The Men of the Sea," it was said, "send before them a great
cloud, as a rain turned to serpents, or a black hail tipped with steel;" and in those
days the great cohorts of the King's Archers used bows made of hollow steel, with black-feathered
arrows a full ell long from point to notch.”
This also gives you a good idea of what the Numenoreans will be like in the show, being
bowmen rather than swordmen; just opposite of what Peter Jackson’s adaptations might
indicate.
Now, with these leaks I think I can also give a much more accurate estimate on what time
period the show will cover. We know from the synopsis that the show will start in a time
of relative peace, and I can already tell you it won’t start any later than the year
1200 of the Second Age, when Sauron first began to gain the trust of the Elves of Eregion.
It could really start anytime before this too, but probably not much earlier than the
year 1000, which was when Sauron began building in Mordor. From there, the first season will
cover at least The Forging of the Rings of Power and the One Ring, which was forged in
the year 1600. They will probably also include the death of Celebrimbor 97 years later, and
could even include the battle of the Gwathlo- and the only issue I see with the first season
lasting so long is that it doesn’t leave much room for the other 4 seasons of the show
to cover. Some of the other events the show might cover are the Fall of Numenor, the death
of Sauron, and some of the other battles taking place in Middle-Earth. One theory that I’m
starting to lean to more and more nowadays is that the show will have different sets
of episodes, some focused on Numenor, some on Eregion, and as much as it pains me to
say this, maybe some focused on Lindon, Elrond, and and Gil-galad. This would make sense because
a lot of the characters they’ll be featuring don’t have all that much to do with each
other, but on the other hand, it might disconnect everything for the viewers.
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As always, thanks for watching. [Quenyan]