‘Rings of Power’ Season 2, Episode 5 Deep Dive | House of R
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Welcome to Naughty Yotta Island. This season on Naughty Yotta Island. When we were new, they spoiled me. They even gave me a phone. But then, it's like I didn't exist. Don't take Yotta Yotta from your wireless carrier. Now with Metro, get that new customer feeling again and again. Introducing MetroFlex. Free 5G phones when you join, same deals as new customers when you stay. Only at Metro by T-Mobile.

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You can put together in a few clicks like the Grand Duchess. That sounds great. Or a huge eight-foot towering Santa with poseable arms and a flame effect lantern. That might be in front of my house. Or an eight and a half foot towering reindeer with illuminated flashing bells. That's the holiday spirit at the Home Depot. Shop in store or online now at homedepot.com. The nine must do far more than bring aid to men. They must bring balance to the entire project.

They must draw strength from the three and somehow redeem the seven. They must redeem us all. Oh, and welcome back to House of R. I'm Joanna Robinson. Joining me today, just to report that everything's fine in Eregion. Don't worry. Everything is just fine. It's Mallory Rubin. Jo, I've heard that these are matters of spirit as much as craft and that that applies to both ringmaking and podcasting. So I'm sure this will go swimmingly today.

Everything's gonna be fine. Don't worry about it. Hello! We're here today to talk about Rings of Power, Season 2, Episode 5. I'm really excited to talk about this episode. There's a lot to get to. Halls of Stone is the name of the episode. Mallory. Joanna. Rings of Power. We are, I'm just, I'm going off script just to say, I am shocked and appalled and devastated to report that we only have three more episodes. I know!

of rings of power talk about how did that happen where did the time go i mean i know how it happened three episodes debuted at once but how did it happen absolute absolute devastation calamity if you didn't

If you did not hear it, we did a music and Tolkien sort of Rings of Power adjacent episode earlier this week. We've gotten a ton of like really lovely feedback from you guys about that episode. So I'm glad you enjoyed it. But if you've only been sort of tuning in for these recaps, I just want to let you know there's bonus Rings of Power content from earlier in the week. And then elsewhere going forward, we've

We are moving into both House of R and also our pals, the Midnight Boys over in the universe, Pew Pew, are moving into our coverage of Agatha all along the Disney Plus Marvel TV show as well as the Penguin show.

Exactly when and how and at what rate those episodes are coming out, TBD a little bit. So just know that we will be covering those shows. We'll be wrapping up the last three episodes of Rings of Power week to week and then diving into those new stories as well. Mallory, how can folks just join us for all of that? How can they keep track of which stuff go? Thanks for asking. Yeah, you're welcome. Here are the recommendations. They're all easy to follow. That's the great news. One, follow the pod. Follow House of R.

Follow the Ringiverse on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Follow the Ringiverse on YouTube. We've got a newish channel there, and you can find full video episodes of House of R and Midnight Boys right there on the YouTube channel and on Spotify. While you're at it, follow the Ringiverse on the social media platform of your choosing. We are on Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, and then...

You want to be referenced at the top of the pod, like the people who just chimed in on the Music of Middle-Earth episode? Send us an email. Send us an email. The inbox is open, hobbitsanddragons at gmail.com. Send your thoughts on Rings of Power, Agatha, Penguin. Folks, it is not too early to start emailing us about Venom or Kraven.

I don't think Mallory especially welcomes your Craven takes. Um, if you're watching us on video, you get to see that Mallory and I have both without communicating with each other, decide to wear fairs on red, uh, to this podcast potato. Very nice shirt game as ever for Mallory Rubin. Um, so we are, uh, in a color scheme supporting the Kingsman, but I think philosophically not supporting the Kingsman on this podcast. Yeah.

Last but not least in this little business section, I just want to say on the spoiler warning front, as ever, we are only talking about up through episode five of this season. We are not watching beyond any of that. We're just talking about up through episode five. Do we assume that you are familiar with the basic plot and premises of the Lord of the Rings films directed by Peter Jackson or the Lord of the Rings books by J.R.R. Tolkien? Yes. In terms of, I guess, the

The spoiler section that we have today is a little bit more, this is what I've sort of settled on, is a little bit like what happens between now and when those movies start. Because there's information we have from The Silmarillion, from Unfinished Tales, from all these sort of book stuff that we can talk about what we might expect to come next.

the remaining episodes of the season or the upcoming seasons. That's all in a spoiler section because I, that feels right to me. So that's, that's what we're doing. It's a little complicated, but that's how we've decided to break it out in this episode of house of our anything else before we get to our opening snapshot, Mallory Rubin. No, let's do it. She's drinking out of a jar. It's a very hobbity move. I feel all right. Like cottage core, you know what I mean? All right. Um,

Let's go now to our opening snapshot. This episode, Halls of Stone, written by Nicholas Adams, directed, once again, a co-direction credit to Louise Hooper and Sanaa Hamri. So, again, I have questions about sort of which sections were moved around or perhaps, you know, they blocked them. They directed them in blocks. I don't know. But these co-direction credits are really intriguing to me. Yeah.

genuinely and insanely long previously on uh in this episode i don't know if you have the same experience yeah i i actually like had to look at the time because it was i i was like i must have like accidentally i like walked away because i i was like this is all fresh on my mind i don't need this i walked away i came back and it was still going on i was like what's happening here

no Harfoots, no stores, no stranger, no Tom bomb, no Southlands, barely any Linden stuff. We are in the Afro aforementioned halls of stone. We're focusing on the doors, new manure and a Reggie and where everything is fine. Don't worry about it. Everything is fine. And a Reggie. Yeah. Episode five seems to be, I mean, we're recording this on Thursday. The episode has only, you know, been out for a few hours of daylight at this point. Um,

But people seem to really like it. I'm curious how you feel about the episode, Mallory. This was my favorite episode of the season. Yeah. Pretty comfortably, actually. Like, I don't know... I'm not committing to any pecking order until the season is complete. I still have the same note, even though I really enjoyed this episode, on the overall kind of thing I'm bumping on with, like, the pacing and structure of the season in terms of how the character sets are divided. Like, this episode...

Part of the reason I like this episode a lot is because it featured... I have notes about some of the things in the episode still, as I know you do and we will get to it, but the episode centered around the characters I enjoy spending time with the most, with a fairly notable exception. This was an episode that featured Durin and Disa quite heavily. We spent a lot of time with our guys, Celebrimbor and Annatar.

Boy, did we spend a nice chunk of time with hot daddy Elendil and said our farewells to Valandil. Got to spend some time with your favorite character, Kemen. Missing, largely missing from the proceedings. I'm sorry. Genuinely, how dare you?

i formally apologize thank you some jokes go too far and that was one exactly i would say that even though we get to see elrond run once in the middle of the episode and then with his curls blowing in the way another great moment for elrond's flowing locks uh and then he has like a brief exchange with gilgallid and

Galadriel is technically in the episode for what I consider a very memorable and intimate brief sequence with Adar that I'm looking forward to discussing it's they're technically here but it's basically an episode that Elrond and Galadriel are not in and Nori and Poppy are not in and the stranger and Bobbiddle as you said are not in so like

Isildur, Estrid, Theo, or Andir. I don't... I'm not sure why the season is playing out this way where we are away from so many key storylines for weeks at a time. And I think that's part of why the previously on had to be so long is because there were characters we just hadn't been with in quite some time. Um...

In terms of the notes, we'll get to them, but I'll just tease broadly that the thing I'm bumping on still on that front is the same thing that I was bumping on in the premiere, which is some of the characters are making decisions and deductions that I don't understand and saying things that I don't quite understand. It's pretty contained and limited. It's not what I would consider a sweeping problem, but it's happening. Like the Caleb Rebore's letter arriving...

And then, like, the conversation around that. I hate this letter. I just thought that was bizarre. And part of why I thought the way it played out was so strange is because that's exactly what I was worried would happen. And very odd. All that said, just had a blast in Khazad-dum. And had a blast in Eregion. And had a blast.

blast watching mariel put her hand on elendil's chest for like what felt to me like 47 minutes of screen time so there was a lot here that i really loved i'm hoping you know we only have three episodes left tragic i'm i'm hoping but i don't know like will some of these characters all be present in those remaining episodes or will we continue to alternate in the next two before we get to like one grand send-off in the finale i i don't i don't know um

Where are you on both the episode and then overall that kind of like blocking episode to episode of character groupings and storylines so that we're only with like three or four storylines per episode?

Great question. Thanks so much. I have to, I'm not ready to say this is definitely my favorite episode of the season, though. I really, really liked it. And because I think there are, there are certain exchanges that sort of lift me higher, like Kiernan or Tom Bombadil, like that sort of stuff sort of elevates me on a different level. I am missing Kiernan, Joanna. Yeah. Yeah.

Come back to us. Go back. Beard or no beard. We don't care. Come back to us. So, um...

you know there are some elements i feel i i really like the hardfoot stuff like i guess a lot of people don't like the hardfoot stuff but i really like it as well sorry this is my first time checking in on the reddit boards all season as you can tell i'm like many people are saying i had not been reading any of it and i was like people don't like the hardfoots what okay so that today i learned uh that some randos on reddit don't like the heart and chris but i was canonically established on the ringer podcast network in frankly shocking fashion

um i in terms of the grouping of storyline i really do think this is a like an overcorrection yeah from season one because i think this was a critique levied at them in season one that we felt like we were bouncing all over the place too much you don't have to check in on everyone every episode and they're like noted yeah got it but instead we're getting these like

really prolonged groupings. And I feel like maybe in season three, there's a sweet spot to hit, or maybe in season three, we'll see more of these plot lines coincide because as we,

break up the outline today as we often do going sort of region by region I couldn't separate a Regian for Khazad-dum like that's there's they're going back and forth too often that I couldn't really peel them away from each other and the more we get that the more it will feel like one bigger cohesive story which I'm really excited about so yeah I really liked this episode I really really liked it quite fun and I just I think I

I was so anxious, as I mentioned, I was so anxious about the, what I knew was going to be lengthy, lengthy, Celebrim or an Anatar talking about smithing together scenes this season. And I was really worried that they would not capture either me or the like wider audience. That does not seem to be the case. I am on the edge of my seat. I think that,

both the Charlies in those scenes are just like really doing it. Really, really killing it. I could watch those scenes on loop and I think never tire of them. It's just electric. It's really good stuff. Okay. A couple quick emails before we get into sort of our breakdown. In response to the ongoing discussion we're having about how soon is too soon to have your kids read Tolkien or is there sort of a kid-friendly version of this?

Sarah wrote in to suggest something called The Hobbit, colon, an illustrated edition adapted by Charles Dixon and Sean Deming, illustrated by David Wenzel. And so that's like a really nice, I think, kid-friendly version of The Hobbit, even though The Hobbit is already a kid's story, like a young, littler kids. So, yeah.

The Hobbit, an illustrated edition adapted by Charles Dixon and Sean Deming. Check it out. And then we got this really interesting email from Leah on the allegory question, which I really loved. We've been joking for, I mean, we've only done like four Rings of Power episodes, but for two weeks now or whatever. But we love a bit. So...

We've been hitting Tolkien, the professor, pretty hard on this idea that he didn't like allegory front, right? And which is to say he – I'll explain. Okay, so Leah in this email is saying when Tolkien said allegory, what he was really talking about was –

okay, we can see this one element of Middle Earth to coincide with something that happened in World War I or World War II. But in Tolkien's mind, to make it allegorical, it would mean that every single thing has to have a direct and exact correlation with, let's say, World War I. And that's, I suppose, according to this email, more what he was bumping up against. So this – I'll quote from the email, which says –

For example, if the One Ring equates to a nuclear weapon, then all the other components of the story of The Lord of the Rings must equate equally to the other components of the, quote, story of World War II. There would need to be a Japan, a Russia, a Pearl Harbor event, and so forth. Since this is obviously not the case per Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings is not allegory. He did allow room for, quote,

However, which I'll just go ahead and extend to quote metaphor. Sorry, professor. Clearly, I believe Tolkien acknowledged this himself. The real life experience of the battle of some, uh, inflects his presentation of war in the Lord of the Rings. This doesn't make it allegory, but certainly does allow it to be a metaphorical means to explore that horror. Similarly, the eradicate eradication of pastoral England at what it meant to him becomes both the presentation of the Shire and later the scouring of the Shire and

Similarly, the resurgence of the war in 1939 after the theoretical war to end all wars is echoed by Tolkien in The Elves, believing that evil had ended forever. Applicability or metaphor, if you like, feels like a permanent false premise in our cultural imagination, but not allegory. So we will...

probably still make this joke but I really did like this email and this clarification that Tolkien wasn't quite as hardline as maybe were making him appear and that yes you can make allusions to the wars that both he and his son fought in and the way in which they impacted his story so anything else you want to say before we delve greedily and too deep delve are you explaining delvecraft to me

I'm Delvesplating to you, baby. Here we go! I'm calling this section Between a Rock and a Hard Place with Doran and Disa and Doran and Narvi and the Eregion crew. And we're just going to start at the very beginning where after a very long previously on, the episode actually starts with the mountain range morphing into via a trick of the camera, this giant gemstone and...

the actor Peter Mullen, who's playing King Durin, his hand in the foreground looking, the ring looks enormous. His hand looks enormous. The ring looks heavy. Like it's a, it's a really cool camera trick and all the rings he walks away. And then we see the rest of the ring, the other six, they all look huge.

huge and heavy. What did you think of this opening image? I loved the peaks of the mountain turning into the ring and establishing before we see the way that the ring is guiding Papa D to the exact striking point that he needs to hit in order to bring Sun back into the mine. This connection between

between stone and stone between power and power uh was really cool and effective and then seeing the rings before we start hearing them whisper whisper troubling no for me folks the rings are so they're like they reminded me of almost like super bowl rings like these are you're right they you can feel the half they're not to my taste personally

I wouldn't wear them. I do like a chunky statement piece of jewelry. I wouldn't wear these, but I do like how different they look from the elven rings. I like that part as well. I'm very excited to see what the nine look like for these covetous men. What particular style will we land on there? I can't wait to find out. Yeah.

Despite the fact that Prince Doran has been like going on diplomacy missions, seemingly reconciled with his dad, he's still working in the mines. He's still just like down there working the mines. And King Doran, not at all put off by the spooky whispers coming from his new church accessory, is like, we're going to we're going to dig here.

And Narvi's like, excuse me, that's a low bearing wall. You cannot, sir. And he's like, I'm going to do it in my robes, in my crown. I'm going to do this. Narvi and the younger Durin are clearly perturbed by this.

I already mentioned his name, but I really do want to shout out Peter Mullen in this episode. He has always been an extraordinary actor. We were really excited when he showed up in season one. He did a great job in season one. But this is like, he gets to shine in this episode and he is tremendous. In a

rapid, but believable, just twisting of a character that we've come to know. Yes. I thought the performance was sensational. I mean, the writing on the show, the acting on the show continues to be just one of the genuine delights of consuming it week to week. The performances are so good and getting to watch, you know, we love a character on an arc.

We do. I'm not sure if this has come up, but... Even the arc is going down. No matter which direction the arc is going. We love a character on an arc, and yeah, to feel in the inflection of his speech or the kind of like... We get different versions of this elsewhere. Like, one of the Celebrant were...

One of the Caleb Rimbaud scenes opens with the subtitle, Caleb Rimbaud breathing heavily. And then, of course, we get the shaking hands and the quivering. And here you have almost this fevered euphoria for Dern as he is tapping into this power. And just the language choice and then the way that that is delivered in the performance. This is where we are meant to dig. The emphasis on meant, the way that that cements not only the ring as guide for Papa D, but the ring as...

binder right like men there's no room there's a wiggle room for interpretation when you say meant right it's like we have to do this this is the thing this is the path and pathways come up a lot in this episode and this is the thing we love to talk about is like how are characters navigating power their lust for it but also any relationship to it losing it gaining it

how that influences what they think is like their ability to choose or circumvent or rework a path versus following it and adhering to it fully so just in the first couple minutes of the episode you feel that so keenly it was fascinating and yeah the outfit like not making an adjustment to the fit to do some frankly very heavy manual labor arduous i mean arduous delving yes this was

We need like, I am not a fan as our listeners know of the

MCUs Pietro choices aesthetically but that's kind of what Papa D needed like let's just get him some athleisure so that he's ready to work too much fabric maybe like I was thinking maybe some Carhartt like he could rock some Carhartt I think as you know I'm a huge Carhartt I know so I support this oh I know no free ads okay no free ads let's say this the performance is good the choice of language is incredible as Mallory pointed out throughout and I want to say this actually at the top

We bumped a little, and I think a lot of people did, and I think rightly so, on how often episode four sort of dipped into just directly airlifting lines from just a few chapters of Fellowship. I really enjoyed how much this episode did not do that. And then it gives the writers, both the credited writer in this episode, but also I know like JD and Patrick do polishes and all the scripts, like everyone knows

Just exquisite language in this episode. Exquisite original language. And that is very exciting to see. And then the visuals. We get this shot and it was in the trailer of King Durin shot through the hole that he has created in the side of the mountain with the light on his face. And he is, as you say, euphoric. He's done it. He's brought light back to his kingdom. We're going to talk about that in a second, right? It's not air we need. It's light.

light as a metaphor that we have talked about again and again and again in Tolkien in general and Rings of Power very specifically light is cleansing light is healing um

but he, he looks like he's in prison. Like he thinks that he, he is like, like Alison tomato made a window in his prison. Right. And, and he's, and it's not the only shot we get like that in this episode, this very intentional, like hemming in of a character. He's already ensnared by Sauron just by doing this. And so I just, I really like that. And I think it is so, and he does this throughout. It's so insidious of Sauron to use, um,

this light, this beautiful cleansing, the hope of middle earth light as the bait, as the snare, as the trap for the dwarves. Uh, it's really, really incredible. Loved this. What'd you think of his, uh, his stump speech to the masses? I loved it. Let's hear it. Pity those who dwell above slaves to the sun, chained to a ceaseless rhythm of waking and sleep. No,

In Kazakdun, we are free of its tyranny. Here, we bring the sun to us. At last, it is daybreak once more in our mountain. Kazakdun!

Oh man. What a great, uh, section to hear hot on the heels of our music episode. Bear McCreary just like really put it all out there for that, that section. Um, there's so much I want to say about this. Uh, there's so much to break down. My initial instinctual reaction was to be so perturbed by the war cry of Kazat Dume, the way they separate those syllables. Uh,

because this echo of doom, doom, doom, uh, is the sound that Tolkien puts into the sections in Moria when, uh,

the orcs are chasing after our heroes and and also in the past when moria fell doom doom doom is like what goes in their journal like when they're you know dear diary today the ball rock escaped it was a hot bummer doom doom doom this is the quote from tolkien the end comes and then drums in the deep doom doom came the drum beat and the walls shook doom

Boom, boom, doom with the drums in the deep. Every now and again, the drum beat throbbed and rolled. Doom, doom. So that was my like initial, oh no. My face was Deez's face. What is your, what do you want to highlight in this speech here? Okay, so I,

Obviously it's just a deeply troubling and concerning opening to the episode for our beloved inhabitants of Gazandum. It's worrying. We are worried. Right before the speech, they're like, next time I order you to dig, you do so. And then right into the speech, this positioning of...

a gift, a boon, a way to provide for his people as something that stemmed directly from I am the sole arbiter of life in our mountain.

There is a, even though that is presented in the moment of the speech as this like shared celebration inside of this community, there is this mounting like tyrannical aspect to what we're watching, right? I am the one in control. I am the one making this decision. You must heed my word. And obviously we've been talking throughout this season and throughout our, all of our Lord of the Rings coverage about like, all right, here's the thing we should be tracking. Not only who is coveting, but then who is seeking to control and control

not just guide but fully account for some circumstance so that was worrying and then the other the doom chant

Love the passage that you read. I was thinking about that as well. I think it's obviously there to ping that for us. But also, like, because we heard this kind of... We're at the Casa de Pepe rally cheer in season one with the... I believe the rock breaking contest, right? It struck me as notable, like, the shift there that...

that was presented to us as this kind of like a good cheer communal gathering to basically watch sports, right? And this is like life and death and how you are going to actually sustain the ecosystem that you depend on to not only mine and seek treasures but exist. Those shifts in context tell us a lot about what has happened in this place in the span of time that we've been watching the show.

My final response, and I don't know what is wrong with me, but I could not stop thinking about this to the point where I went to like look for evidence in the book because I was so hung up on this. I'm like, wait a minute, Papa D with love. This is not the way the sun works. Like I was like, was he talking about the sun? Like it's just going to be a light switch they can leave on now all

Absolutely. And I was like, no, what he's like, pity them slaves to the sun. And I'm like, they actually just get to be outside and the sun works the same way for you as it does for the light. Yeah. And that was what I was like, wait, did I forget something about how the, this works? And then I found that passage from fellowship. There used to be great windows on the mountainside and shafts leading out to the light in the upper reaches of the mines. I think we have reached them now, but it's,

is night outside again and we cannot tell until morning so my main note for papa d is that's not how the sun works my guy and when you start losing control of the facts it's worrying like there is actually a little bit of that in how he's presenting this it's like it's propaganda for his achievement without really being rooted in reality absolutely yeah it's it's the mission accomplished banner it's just sort of like what are you talking about um

I like that the language, though, because we will get we will hear from a few more speeches as we cover this episode. And this has so much in common with what Farazan is talking about over Numenor, this idea of the cycle of the sun and and being a slave to those cycles and stuff like that. So we will we'll talk about that a little bit later on. But it is important, I think, that these people start to sound like each other to a certain degree through the lens of their specific cultures. Yeah.

Disa and a nameless blonde resonator who I don't think we've ever met. They look troubled. They look pissed, right? Dorian Jr. is like, yeah, dad, sick. And Disa's like, uh-uh, no, no, no. And I just really like this idea of

This idea of the speeches, I think, is really interesting. It's really interesting to emphasize these leaders, Celebrimbor, Farazan, Doran, giving these speeches versus something like the resonating that Disa did these conversations. Obviously, like, Celebrimbor and Annatar, who is also Sauron, have a lot of conversations. But, like, to go from, like, open dialogue to proclamations, declarations, demands is...

is a notable shift inside of this episode which I really liked and I mean I think this idea of the resonators being in conversation with the rocks versus Doran demanding something from the rocks is feeds right back into what we were talking about last week with good old Tom Bomb and Aran Deer

And Arandir, the way that they were coaxing and soothing the trees and just sort of working in collaboration with nature versus this desire to have dominion over it. And so I can connect Disa singing to and hearing from the rocks with Tom Bombadil crooning at Old Man Ironwood or whatever. And King Doran...

demanding, exacting, which is an unnatural thing to do in this world. Oh, I love that. That's just a fabulous observation. It's impossible, I think, hearing you lay that out to not recall that the season began with us watching the

Sauron make a speech and then get stabbed in the back by his nominal followers. So yeah, this feels like very intentional. Fabulous thing to point out. In terms of Disa...

This is, you know, not the way that she wanted her fellow resonators to stop gossiping, but this was not the way that she wanted it to happen. Stunned into silence watching Papa D talk about how he controls the sun. And then to your point about, I love that observation too about the

specific lens of the culture but the through lines that we're observing across the story sets because it made me think of the we hear a few different times in this episode in different locations somebody touting what the new age will be for their right the new this is the age of men well this new age of dwarves and it's like everybody is focused but are any of them thinking about how they will relate to each other in those pursuits or fellowship or community fellowship no alliance

All right. King Doran's not the only one giving speeches, as we mentioned. Celebrimbor has a few to give in this episode. I loved this scene. Not just because, okay, we get the doors of Doran. Our guy Narvi is here to talk proudly about his creation and we can talk about all that stuff. But I just like I'm obsessed with Doran.

everyone's of good cheer. Yeah. Celebrimbor's like, look what we accomplished. Narvi's like, this door is so cool. I cannot wait to talk to you about it. A new west gate of our mountain, unbreachable, visible only by moonlight and guarded by a password known only to friends. And we're like, ooh, you know what that means? All that sort of stuff like that. And Annatar's like,

I'm pissed. I don't like this. We're not making rings. I benefit not at all from these doors. And I'm going to ruin Caleb Brimbor's good times immediately. And then what was our shared other favorite point of this moment, Mallory Rubin? We could talk just about like the first 30 seconds of the scene for an entire podcast because it was frankly extraordinary.

I'll circle back to all the other parts of it, but in terms of what you are referencing here. Early in Celebrimbor's address, he says, today we embark upon a new dream to enshrine our friendship in stone. And as he says that, we pan to. Genuinely my favorite moment of the season so far. I'm being serious. So funny. A just town bad Merdania turning to Annatar, who was Sauron, and kind of like,

the arm in a like yay us maybe we'll fuck at the after party kind of toast and he is miserably not only not returning that gesture but miserably watching kella brimbor make friendship doors instead of forging the nine this was to me an instantly iconic rings of power moment that i genuinely adored i thought it was incredible

The visual comedy to me of the cut to Merdania and Annatar and no one else is anywhere near them. And she is smushed right up next to him. Incredible. With no excuse. It's so funny. Uh, which of course, you know, we'll come back to, um, I love seeing the doors of Doran. We, we sort of talked, you know, we got, we got a hint that they were coming. Um,

with the Ithildin reveal early in the season with the character of Narvi who we know from Lord of the Rings is the one who co-pro'd these doors with Celebrimbor but I was you know it felt like again we'll talk about this a little later on if people are going to have a similar like this is too much Fellowship of the Ring content for me but like I don't know the doors of Doran they had to be built sometime and I really like seeing them here especially the economy of

of including that and have it be a character note for Sauron, you know, I think was really interesting. I loved this. I had an interesting, I was thinking about Elrond a lot watching this and I had a kind of interesting, like, I felt super proud on his behalf because of this union and then also like deeply sad for it.

Because first of all, he's not there to celebrate in this, like said to be impossible, but our cooperation has achieved this wonder. This is the thing that he believed in and that he was seeking and that his friendship with Durin symbolized and like proved could be possible if everyone would just be open-minded. If anyone would just be open-minded enough to consider that they could bring that into their lives too. And he doesn't get to witness it because he's running through the fucking woods trying to get to Gillendine to

It's a disaster for Elrond right now, just brutal. And also because we are then so worried about what is actually unfolding at the Forge at Eregion, and the way that this union and this fellowship and this friendship and this collaboration is just one more...

chisel moving mysteriously through the air that Sauron is using to achieve his ends. So Elrond, even though he wasn't in the episode a ton was on my mind a lot and including certainly here. Always thinking about Elrond, to be honest with you. Same. What I love that we see on Displace and we already saw it in his infiltration of Eregion, all this sort of stuff is like, there was this question in season one where,

was Sauron pulling all the strings from the start? Did he make Galadriel go to the raft? Did he do this, that, you know, thing? And I think, no, I think Sauron is the world's greatest improviser. And he's like, I will pivot. Watch me pivot here. Here's me pivoting. Um, and so when he sees that he is sort of losing his grasp on Celebrimbor throughout this episode, he'll make a lot of moves, but here he's playing, uh,

The, like, petulant – to me, it looked like petulant, like, bratty younger boyfriend to old sugar daddy when he's like, you're not allowed to have fun with your friends. I'm not having fun, so I'm going to ruin your fun, too. And your speech was too long and your hair looks bad. Like, it was just so bratty and shitty of him, and I really enjoyed it. I –

Absolutely love this. I was thinking of us. I encouraged you to keep it short. And truth is, I should have spoken longer. I was just like, wow, they're just pulling the conversation at the end of a House of R recording between us and Stephen Arjuna. I encouraged you to keep it short. But also...

I thought this was, as we talk about the varying success of when we are with or not with characters, the compressed timeline, the pace at which things need to unfold inside of the show versus how they unfold in the story, in the text.

This was the kind of exchange that I thought really effectively and like necessarily allows us to feel how much time has passed between the characters. Like you don't have a moment like that if you haven't had a lot of afternoons and evenings and mornings working at the forge together. Days and sessions and meetings and conversations that we haven't seen. Like you could just feel that they've been inhabiting a space and a world together even though we haven't always accessed it with them. Right.

Right, we've been away from them for episodes. I do think things start to fall apart when you try to line up all the storylines because of what that means. Because it feels like they've been together weeks, months. They made these elaborate seven rings for the dwarves. Like, you know, all of that has Elrond been in the forest is the question you have to ask yourself. This is actually driving me kind of crazy. I don't know. I mean, I know we have it later in the outline, but like, I will just say that

Watching Elrond run, I think one response could be, love it. Way to hustle, buddy. Some urgency. Here, my response was, the season opens with Elrond riding a horse to the same location on an urgent mission. Why is he traveling by foot? Like, obviously we saw the previous sequences and we know that there are things afoot that are inhibiting Elrond.

their pursuit but that actually just does seem like a convenient choice that is being made in the story to delay the moment when their company had to fracture in the first place the moment when elrond will arrive back at lyndon etc and so that that is not the most successful part of the season so far you mentioned early in the season that like there were going to be some

Game of Thrones, how slowly or quickly are people traveling? Comps on our mind watching this. It felt apparent right away. And this is definitely, definitely one of them. But glad you found your hustle now, Elrond. Good to see. Good to see. Better late than never, I guess. I love this line. To go back to Celebrimbor and Annatar, who's also Sauron.

When Celebrimbor says it is a game he plays at night, sowing seeds in others' minds and then convincing them the fruit is of their own thought. The idea that Celebrimbor is not entirely a dum-dum being manipulated by Annatar, that you have these ebbs and flows, I think is such a smart aspect of the season because he's... Yes, he's dazzled by him. He's seduced by him. He gets...

pressured in various ways uh you know preying upon this vulnerability or that vulnerability to ultimately get what he wants so xauron ultimately is pushing him in all the right directions but it's not an easy push and it requires a bunch of different zigs and zags yeah and so the fact that we get this push back here from kelobun bor i think is really important what did you want to say about this line yeah i i agree with that i think like it makes it it

This is, you know, one of the most consequential things in the history of this fictional universe, the forging of the rings of power. And so it has to unfold in a way that we are deeply impacted by. And so there is a tragedy to this. The fact that Celebrimbor is aware that something doesn't feel right heightens the tragedy that he is being swept up in this deception. But also, so it works effectively for both characters, because also,

it just makes us more impressed watching Sauron at work, right? And to your point earlier about, like, how he's an improviser, we've, I think, felt that consistently in how he's interacting with Celebrimbor. He's ready to pivot instantaneously based on whatever Celebrimbor says or does or is feeling in a given moment so that he can continue to ensnare him. And so, like...

You know, he's Sauron. Like, it's not only the central villainous force in this particular television show we're watching. Like, this is the great villain in the history of story. Like, it's got to be good. You know, you have to be impressed watching him work his craft. And part of his craft is deception. And so, like, we'll get to it later, but when we hear him just literally describing to Celebrimbor's face what he is doing to him by manipulating him, you're awed by it.

it awed by it so i thought that that was part of why i really loved the episode because it was a great portrait of how sarah is able to operate and achieve also i was just like is kelly brimboir a big inception fan like does he just like does he just mainline christopher nolan movies at night this was that's just that was the other thing i bet kelly brimboir's favorite nolan film is the prestige i think he's a prestige guy i mean that movie rules

I think that Charlie Vickers as Hal Brandon, Annatar and Sauron, and like, we're going to get to see him do even more in future seasons. Like, yeah, this is the spine of the show. This is, this is it. And, um,

And he's just like constantly delivering and it's, and it's wild. I mean, in terms of like a casting choice, it's wild because Charlie Vickers did not have a significant CV before the show. So like, you know, this was the most important casting for them to nail and they just knocked it out of the park. Yeah, absolutely. We get a little lore, lore corner with Sauron, right? Because Sauron's trying to convince Caliburn more hashtag not all men, right?

some of the men are bad, but not all of them. And, and let's talk about it before he, before he highlights three specific men who were not that bad. Uh, if you recall, um, he, I think truthfully says he fears Numenor more than any other land on earth. He's been there. He knows, uh,

At what level they're operating in Numenor. So he knows that they are a threat to his desire to conquer Middle-earth. And that was fun, too, because we talked about this a bit in season one, but it allowed us to...

It allows you to just kind of go back in time and think about his, what we watched from him when he was there. You know, the way that he would look at the forge or the way that he would interact with the guildsmen, the fights in the street, the way that he would prove to himself, like, did he have to, like, crack that guy's arm in half and bash his head into a wall? No, but, like, you can now go back. He needed to prove his dominance over them, right? And then, like, even, you know, with Galadriel, when he's like, I, like, I begged you to let me stay, right? Yeah.

Obviously part of that is this great mind game that is always afoot, but what would desiring to stay in Numenor mean for him? Is it because he just wanted to have like a lovely island life or because he wanted to be able to, and this gets back to what we were talking about in the premiere, right? With like,

when was it finally actually too late? And when was there still that glimmer of a possibility of like, you make the choice the next day to be good again. Yeah. And so how much of it was like, maybe this could be a place where I could do things differently and how much of it was, I have to keep an eye on the people that I fear and the people who I know could actually challenge me. And if I'm here, I could watch, I can monitor and I can undermine. It's, it's fun now to think back to the season one scenes.

He's like, they have aqueducts. It's pretty advanced, so I gotta keep my eye on them. He's like, Numenor, Silicon Valley, same threat level to me. This is what he says to Kilmer Bor, right? He says, when the darkness falls, there are always some who rise forth and shine.

And then he names three guys. Here we go. Number one, Aaron deal. You know him, you love him. It's Elrond's dad who turned into a star, but before he became a star, he was just a guy being a dude falling in love with a hot Elvin babe who became a bird. So that's some of your best work. That's Aaron deal, right? Elrond's dad, the star, uh, Kell Brimbor literally knew him. We, we talked about that in season one. Um,

And Arendelle literally shines because of a Silmaril, the morning star that's on his brow as he traverses the sky. So that's case number one. Case number two, a more obscure name, because two out of the three of these we've talked about before, but a more obscure name, Tor, is another person that he brings up. That's Arendelle's dad.

a great hero of the Edain. And there's this quote, in spite of being a man, capital M man, savage from Tolkien, he was chosen by the Vala Ulmo to be the last hope of the Noldor in the face of annihilation by forces of Morgoth. And,

Per tradition, he is the only man to be accepted as one of the elder kindred and will share with them an immortal life in Valinor as long as Arda will endure. And so Elrond's like, shit, not only is my dad amazing, but my granddad is also a hero of great renown. Yeah.

And last but not least, we talked about him a lot in the music episode. It's Baron, son of Barahir. And the way he said it, I think, is meant to make us think of Aragorn, son of Arathorn, the way that he says that heroically. Or Bron, son of, you wouldn't know him. Yeah, either. Yeah. This is Luthien's husband. They took Isilmarillion out of Borgos Kraut and then they lost it. But they took it and that matters. Okay. Yeah. The intention matters. Okay. Yeah.

So Sauron names three mortal men, half-elven at least, mortal men who fell in love with and married elven babes. A fun thing for heroes to do.

But he also identifies threats to himself by naming men who did serious damage to Morgoth. They're exactly the kind of men he needs the Nine Rings to take off the board before they can become the heroes who can stop him. And that urgency is highlighted in the stark difference between a Kemen and an Elendil or a Valandil. Kemen's not a threat to Sauron.

Elendil is cut from the same cloth as these heroic men that he is mentioning here. I thought you were just going to say Elendil is cut. I'm like, okay, now I understand this episode a little bit better. But Sauron's like, okay, what fucked my old boss up? And how can I not make that same mistake? So he needs the Nine Rings to try to ensnare Elendil.

similar to the ones that he just outlined here. And we love a lore dump, honestly. So thank you so much for that. Great stuff. Great stuff. We had previously invited Elrond on the pod and now we would like to, controversial though it may be, formally extend the invitation. Sauron, come on House of Arr. No notes. 10 out of 10 no notes.

This is not... It convinces me it does not convince Celebrimbor. He's like, nope, I'm not going to do it. And then Annatar, who I guess has been spending time watching the Infinity Saga, says, fine, I'll do it myself. He doesn't quite say that, but he goes full Thanos. He's like, oh, sure. Okay, sure. Fine. I'll do it. And Celebrimbor, for some reason, is like, okay, fine.

I don't know why, but you know, this was incredible to watch. I'll save most of my commentary on the way that he is baiting him for the part later where they taught him to drop the, well, we did this. We just added up. We just dumped a bunch of extra meat. Was that not the way recipe, but in general, like this, this is, this search was great. You know, the, the men are covetous line. We had heard from Kelly Brimbor back in the second episode and the, in the multi-episode season premiere, we know his stance and,

Sauron knows his stance. There are going to be unpredictable things that he has to adjust to in real time, and then there are going to be the constants that he has to really work to undermine and warp to his favor. And I love what you're saying about the way that he's citing... You mentioned that Erendil and

have history and like of course we heard kelly mcgure talk to elrond about that in the first season and so to take like these great figures and myth and lore for us as readers and viewers but also these figures who have this weight and heft for the character and sign and try to use that to sway him like we'll pick we'll pick the good ones why wouldn't you trust me in our meaningful time together here and all of my notes about the length of your speeches to just

to just pick the good ones it'll be fine and the idea that like he can at once plot his course by saying think about these people that you respect and that you have history with or you know of like as people of consequence and friendship right and adoration and then also in doing that like as you're saying identify the people he needs to take off the board and control but like

What's the real... I mean, when we think of that covetous line or we think of Elrond in the trilogy, he's like, men are weak, right? Men are weak, yeah. And we're tracking in our second ring and in the mailbag, et cetera, we're tracking our candidates for Nazgul watch. Like...

He has to seek the threats to take them off the board, but also seek the figures who he believes he can bend to his will, who he believes he can deceive. And, like, that's a continuation, I think, of what we were just talking about, about how part of the takeaway of this season is going to be, Sauron, pretty good at being bad. Like, that's going to be a hard thing to do, right, with those figures of consequence. I'm...

I'm very excited that we're in the, like, you will make me the nine phase of the story. I think this is going to be great. Thrilling. Three rings are nice. Seven rings are okay. But nine rings. That's what we're really cooking. Delightful. Deesa's pruning the friendship tree. Got some dead leaves on it. Yeah. It's not doing super well, it seems like. Well, you know, no sunlight.

And then she talks about the fact that the resonating she does versus the slap dash weird whispering shit that King Doran is doing to find the holes to dig.

This is a gift from Aule. Let's talk about Aule for a second, shall we? This is a god, just in case you didn't know. He's also a smith. He's a smith god, so it's like Hephaestus or Fulcan without the marital strife, I would say. Aule created the dwarves, so that's very important. And...

because he wanted to have like disciples to share his gifts with and seven seven starter doors by the way seven is a very important number for the dwarves his name means invention he loved teaching people his craft he had a few significant students that you may have heard of number one

You know, Fanor, you made that really beautiful looking hammer. Celebrimbers are always like Fanor. I will never live up to him. Fanor also broke quite bad, by the way. So Celebrimber being like Fanor, the ultimate is like, I don't get a different hero. I think, um,

But the main apprentice that we want to talk about for Aole is Sauron. Yeah. Sauron is a disciple of Aole. So it's, it's, it's not where all of his smithing skill comes from. So it's all the more fucked up that he's trading in this perverted version of Aole's great gift to the dwarves of resonating. He's like, I can do that with spooky whispers. Yeah.

I just really liked this little mention here. Yeah. These are, I mean, we always love a moment with, with Deesa. The show has, I think, a,

genuine knack for these organic, seamless, casual mentions and incorporations of the lore and the history of the world into conversation and in a way that is, I think, very rewarding for Tolkien heads and not at all like a blocker for people who don't have that history. That's just not an easy balance to achieve, especially given the volume of those moments. And I think they really do it with a deft hand. So that's impressive to me.

And again, in terms of the way that the show is able to constantly present subtly, I think often these connections between moments and character sets and places like the trimming of the leaves. Okay. The sun was out for some period of time. Our ability to measure the passage of time on the show, as we've said, our weeks. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Yeah.

But for some period of time. And so, like, my assumption seeing that was some of the leaves withered because they were deprived of the beam of sunlight that then bedazzles them again. But the thing that you're thinking of when you see that is the blight on the great tree in Linden and the way that those leaves were corrupted and befouled. And so there is this, in that connection and in that memory and association, we're watching Papa D tout the...

the achievement and also the future the well positioned moment for kaza doom and i'm like in addition to all the fear and the notes that ping are worry like this there's a sense of doom then in that association a sense of doom creeping and crawling and befalling a people doom doom

Yeah. Also, I would add, I love all of that. I would also add, I think of that tree as a symbol of Doran and Elrond's friendship, right? And the fact that it is neglected, aka rings of power. We would like an Elrond and Doran scene soon, please. Thank you so much. I know.

So we're going to go to the market with Dern and Disa. Before we do, I just want to say like Disa in this episode is so staunchly anti-ring that I'm taking her off my, she was on my leaderboard for like right before manipulation or seduction by Sauron. I don't think so anymore. What do you, what do you think?

Yeah, I agree. This, in general, this is one of the things about this season that I was like in the first few episodes...

a little bit worried about, but this episode, it's part of why I liked it. I really bought in the inversion of the positions of the characters in this particular slice of the story. You know, we talked a lot. Yeah. The Durans and also like what you're citing about Disa, you know, Durin and, and the Durans have a, literally have a conversation about that in this episode, which is also helpful, but you know, this idea that, um,

And Durin and Disa were the ones in season one who were like, dig, delve, Mithril. It's ours. It's yours. And it's mine. And like, this will be our kingdom and it will be what we make. And we were like, oh, fuck. We really like these characters. We don't want them saying things like this. And Papa D was reserved and he was all about restraint and caution at the expense, at the kind of hideous expense of helping and potentially saving the

an entire race of people. So I was like, okay, this is an interesting microcosm of this question in the season so far. Do we have enough to believe that the characters would inhabit this new space? And the thing I actually really like at this point in the season about this flip for these characters is, first of all, again, they're consciously aware of it and interrogating it. D. Son Durin actually also have a conversation about it. He's like, you were the one who wanted me to pursue this.

She's like, not like this. Yeah. They still feel, even though the specific thing they're either like afraid of or coveting has flipped, they're actually still rooted in, I think, the same guiding principle. And that's why it works. Like they, during baby D, D junior, little D, what are we going with? I don't know. Papa D really feels right during the younger.

He was, like, always trying to think boldly and ambitiously and in a new kind of, like, progressive way about the future. And Papa D wanted to exert control in the form of, again, caution and, like, heeding no counsel. He also would heed no counsel before he had the ring. And, like, those things actually have not changed. So, yeah, I think this is actually being handled, like, quite well. And I'm with you at least where we are right now with Disa. I'm no longer...

uh i'm no longer concerned that she will fall though i am in general still very concerned about these people being okay based on what we witness in the next sequence i'm very worried okay we're haggling over a tuning stone boy disa drops it and just like cannot for the effing life of her catch up to the stone this was tough for our girl disa

She goes straight to a crevice. I thought, as you know, I mourned for you. Automatic pass for me. I would be like, bye bye tuning stone. Yeah. I'll buy another one. Yeah. So she like sort of wiggles her way through this crevice into a, into a chamber where she's like, what's this? I've never seen this before. She's like a stone's throw from the market. I had some questions about this like unexplored cave. That's quite close to the market. But anyway, so she goes in there.

And here we get our Beastie of the Week. I think this is what counts. We were talking about how one of the co-creators, J.D. Payne, was saying they kind of wanted to have a monster every single week on the show. And this week we get this thing in the water. Last week, when Erundir and Estrid and he really didn't do anything helpful, but sure, Isildur killed that mudworm in the Southlands.

Arandir mentioned nameless things, and we talked about this last week, but here we go again, right? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Far, far below the deepest delving of the dwarves, the world is gnawed by nameless things. Even Sauron knows them not. They are older than he. Now I have walked there, but I will bring no report to darken the light of day. That's Gandalf.

post Balrog fight saying there's some spooky stuff down there and we don't even have a name for it. Okay. When Galadriel and Halbrin encounter the sea worm, the worm in the ocean that we saw again at the start of the season, they,

Amazon has trivia that you can click on while you're watching something on Prime Video. It said of that creature, it said, quote, the Great Sea or the Sundering Seas divides the undying lands to the Middle Earth where there are still nameless things in the deepest pieces of the world.

So that creature in the ocean, that creature in the mud, and this creature in the water here are all of sort of the same classification because they're

This is very likely the creature... It does have a name, but it's called one of the nameless The Watcher, The Watcher in the Water, that Frodo and the Fellowship encounter outside the doors of Dorin. Yeah. He's also mentioned in the Deer Diary. Today, Moria went to shit. The Watcher got oin. It sucked. So this is...

This is the Watcher and likely some people are like, is that the Balrog? I don't think it is. I think it's supposed to be the Watcher in the water. But I really liked this here.

I liked it less later when King Doran says we should be delving much deeper. That felt a little on the nose to me, but I don't mind the proximity of the doors of Doran in this episode and the watcher in the water. But for people who didn't like the Barrow-Whites being so close to Tom Bombadil in last week's episode, I don't know if this will feel similar. Didn't feel that way to me at all. I really actually also liked the Barrow-Whites and Tom Bombadil in the same episode last week. But what do you think of this revelation of this particular spooky thing?

Yeah, so my first thought when something spooky and horrible started to groan and roar and surge water toward our beloved Disa was just... I was like, oh, I wonder if this is the Balrog because obviously we saw the Balrog last season waiting down below and...

I think this falls into our, like, we're not pretending people haven't seen the trilogy or read the books. We know that there's a future work to do for the Balrog in this area, right? So that was my first thought. But then when I was parsing the particulars of what happened, it does feel a little more Watcher in the Water to me. I think the descriptions from Fellowship of the Watcher

just match what we're seeing here. The other swung around and saw the waters of the lake see

seething as if a host of snakes were swimming up from the southern end or another passage the arm let go of Frodo and Sam pulled him away crying out for help 20 other arms came rippling out the dark water boiled and there was a hideous stench now we got no mention here of reeking we do get mentions of things reeking elsewhere which I cannot wait to discuss but that just I mean those descriptions of what's happening to the water kind of like completely match with what happens yeah right so yeah

Meanwhile, while Deesa's getting the shit scared out of her by a very scary thing, and I just urge everyone listening, never go in a crevice. There's no good reason to. Absolutely not. Just don't do it. Okay? With everything happening here at this point in time, no. No. No. Just say no to a crevice. Okay. Okay.

King Dwarven is talking to the emissaries from the other Dwarven lords, Dwarven kings. I think a question that I have, because we've been talking about the nine a lot, and we'll talk about this a little bit more in our second ring spoiler section, but do you think we're actually going to see the other six Dwarven lords? I don't know. Or if we see them, are they going to be actual characters or just other dwarves with crowns wearing the rings? Yeah. I mean...

I guess the latter seems more likely based on where we currently are, right? Yeah. Like, certainly in the span of this season, we only have three episodes to go. Obviously, we have subsequent seasons ahead of us, but it does feel like inside the remaining time this season, we will just learn or quickly glimpse that these have been handed. Which, I'm, like, a little torn on how I feel about this. Because on the one hand, I think for, like, the sake of...

efficiency and like a compact focused streamlined story this is actually the right decision to make sense you are able to glean the important things thematically through characters and relationships you are you're invested in right we have what we need on that front and because they're actually like sometimes in other tales we might be like well you know is everyone the same and they're gonna make that like

We just don't have time to, like, at this point, learn and meet six new characters and learn everything we need to know about them to be as impacted by the choices that they make as we would be by what we're watching with Papa D. And so, like, he's our access point to that. I guess the flip side for me is, like, boy, isn't the point of the... One of the points of the show...

To show us how the rings of power were forged and then what they did to the people who took them. So if, like, we're really limited in our consideration set there, I have, like, some trepidation about that. But stop me if you've heard this before, Jo. I'm up to your minds. Well, what do you think on this? I'm open, I think, to swaying either way. I feel similarly. Like, I think that the three rings being on three very different hands. Yeah.

We don't know what's going to happen with the nine. And we'll talk about that a little bit more later. Yeah. I would hate for the dwarves to be the only group that get like one person representing them in that way. You know what I mean? But at the same time, I don't feel like I have the time or patience necessarily to meet. I mean, I'm delighted to meet Narvi this season, but like, I don't know that I have space to go to like many different dwarven kingdoms. Um, yeah.

Here's what Duran says. King Duran says, Papa D, if you prefer, and it is troubling. He says, power over earth, power over rock, power to shape the destinies of dwarves forever. And I think I heard Tom Bombadil drop his honey when he heard that. Like, he's just like, uh-uh, no, no, no, no. That's not what we do at all. I heard Waldo. This idea of...

Tis a power error. It's true. Sauron's spreading influence, not only corrupting the minds of the individuals that he is controlling, but

But the actual corrosion of the natural world that we're getting, like, be it trees in Linden or no. Yeah. Be it the desert in Rune that was a bunch of a verdant valley. Be it the crumbling of the rock. We're just Swiss cheesing, like, the walls of this mountain. I'm very concerned about it. Or, and we'll talk about this later, I would say the blood-sullied waters of Numenor. Like, it's just...

His influence is everywhere and touching everything. And literally, especially for a character who claims he wanted to heal the earth, this overt damage and corrosion and corruption of the natural world is fascinating. Yeah. I really loved this part. Like,

We have our signs and portents aspects of this, right? He thinks that they have passed this test, right? He says that way. Like, we... My people have passed this test, and soon yours shall pass it, too. The assembled emissaries have no comment. No questions and no comments. They're just lusting after, like, me and... No lines. ...and new jewelry. They did not get their SAG card. No. Yeah. But, like...

Okay, they were granted this balm via the ring, and it led them to the light, and light is more precious than air. Like, this is, I think, if we're being generous and charitable, actually, like, an kind of easy mistake to make, right? That you could come to this place if you were in his shoes. Yeah. The thing I'm... One of the things I'm really loving this season is that we were already talking about this a little bit today, and it's going to be something I think we continue to revisit. The people, the characters who are making these...

Alarming or treacherous or outright bad choices are aware that something is wrong. They're not blind to the fact that there is some sort of threat. They are making those choices because they know something's wrong, because there is a threat. And so it gets back to the thing we love to revisit from season one, which

right? Give them a means of mastering it so that you can master them and how that continues to rear its head as really like, just put the mission statement right out there on like front street. And it's been there for us the whole time. Should he do a Ted talk and or write like a new edition of the power or something like that? So is this the secret? Should we all be following? I think you'd do great. I think you'd do great. And, and then you had your point about like the healing, you know,

the greed and the hubris that are on display here like this is a desire to control not just to heal or to heal in order to uh further some sort of hold on power and so that is a thing that we in this universe are trained to fear like this season on naughty island when we were new they spoiled me they even gave me a phone but then it's like i didn't exist

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it's just alarm bell city with everything that we're watching here. Speaking of alarm bell city, uh, tools are flying all around the shop in Oregon as Mardonia is having some sort of, uh, in her invisible state. She's put on one of the rings and she has gone into the unseen world. Now, I don't know how I would react if I went into the unseen world, probably not well. Um, but I don't know that I'd just be like tossing tools on the floor, but maybe I would. Um,

fact about Merdania, who is a show-invented character, that the Merdain are the jewelsmiths. So the whole group are called the Merdain in the book. So they named her Merdania as sort of this emblem of the larger jewelsmithry that's happening around in Eregion. But

I love this, what I'm going to call weaponizing competence from Annatar. The way that he's like, I don't know, man. We just thought we'd dump a bunch of myth. Do you think we should do something different? Should we have not been loading the dishwasher that way? How would you do it? Show us, dear master. I find Calibramore's anguish and conflict over watching people fumble a job he knows how to do deeply relatable personally.

But also we should say that these sort of lesser rings, because Mardonie puts on a ring that is not ultimately one of the nine. These are canonical, right? No. These are canonical. Quote, in Eregion long ago, many elven rings were made. Magic rings, as you call them, they were of various kinds. Some were potent, some less. The lesser rings were only essays in the craft before it was full grown. And to the elven smiths, they were but trifles.

yet still to my mind dangerous for mortals. That's Gandalf. And we would say yes, especially given what Merdania saw. Can we hear this clip, please? I was in a place like this, shrouded in mist and darkness. I saw right. At first I thought it was the forge burning, but it wasn't. What was it? It was tall,

And its skin was made of flames. It came toward me, breathing, reeking of death. And I saw its eyes, pitiless and eternal. I think it's been here. I think it's been here among us all along. Incredible. Mardonia, you sweet summer child, I have bad news for you. Brutal. Brutal. So Mardonia sees Sauron in his true form. Yes.

And does not know what she saw. And if she did, would she still cozy up and pat him on the shoulder? Probably not. Probably not. What I love about this is that Sauron, who is also Annatar...

Actually, his poker face is super strong in this sequence. He does not seem all that perturbed by her describing his true form. Do you disagree? Kind of, yeah. I felt like we lingered on his face and he was really clocking this in a meaningful way. And that a lot of what is unfolding subsequently with the particular attention that he's giving to her is because she has...

seen his true self. And, like, obviously later we'll hear him, you know, explain, like, shows you things as they really are. This was great. Like, I...

the fact that kind of first for a beat, you think again, this is one of the many Balrog fake outs in the episode. Like just for a second, you're like, she's describing a Balrog. Oh no, she's describing Sauron. And you know, again, we obviously as fans of the trilogy are going to associate Sauron most of all with like this, this eye wreathed in flame. And this, this television series begins with Galadriel, like describing him as, you know, one who's very hand is flame unquenched. And, uh,

So it's only like a millisecond before you're like, oh yeah, she's, no, she's, she's, she's talking about Sauron. But there was, I, part of what I was interested in, in his face in that moment is like, because we've been kind of tracking this, like, could he have lived a different life and been a different person? He also has to confront that that's his true form. Yeah.

right like he's got to stare that in the face this is a very tough moment for us put all kinds of wigs on but at the end of the day you're still Sauron like for us for Galadriel for Merdania for everyone who had a has a real like we could fix the would-be king of the Southlands we could fix just give us a try it's tough to hear skin made of flames breathing reeking of death it's just not ideal I loved it

I loved it too. I agree with you. He's definitely clocking in. Of course, it is all part of what he does next.

But I just thought the contrast between him, like, I think kind of playing it very cool versus his reaction next when Celebrimbor is like, when they're like, Durin's here. He's stressed because the rings are doing bad shit to his dad. And, and Anatar is like, I'll take care of it. And Celebrimbor was like, no, I got this. And Anatar is like, okay, time to pivot. New plan. He's saying no too many times to me. Time, time to find a new plan. Right? So this is when we get the,

Absolutely incredible. Anatar-Merdania interaction. For a couple reasons. So he's pivoted to basically a new mark. He's like, losing my hold on Celebrimbor. This dumb lady was patting my arm earlier. Perhaps I can make it work with her, right? He says, quote, some who've seen the unseen world are never at home in this world again. And so, of course, I think of Frodo and I think of

you know, save the Shire, but not for me. Like you can't go back, all of that sort of stuff, but also the Nazgul, the wearers of the nine, right? Because this is the quote from the Silmarillion. They could walk if they would unseen by all eyes in this world beneath the sun. And they could see things in the world's invisible to mortal men, but too often they beheld only the phantoms and delusions of Sauron. They became forever invisible. Yeah.

Save to him that wore the ruling ring and they entered the realm of shadows. The Nazgul were they, the ring race, the enemy's most terrible servants. Darkness went with them and they cried with the voices of death. So Mardonia, do not put that ring on again. Yeah. Okay. Not ideal. Yeah. Not ideal. And then we get this, right? And it's like, okay, it was good.

That weird, flamey thing, evil thing, reeking of death you saw is Celebrimbor. He's really tired. He's exhausted. He's been project managing. It's been very tough for him. It definitely wasn't me. I'm hot. It was your boss. He's tired. It was him. He talks about wanting to heal. I wasn't going to tell you because I want to heal Celebrimbor first before I told you. Right. That's that's his favorite word. And then he gets really fucking evil as far as I'm concerned, because he goes, how strange.

When the light caught your hair for a moment, you seemed her perfect likeness. Why, Lady Galadriel, of course. Evil. Shit. From Sauron. Okay. We're going to parse this. What's your immediate reaction to this? I just once again have to kind of fess up to the fact that I would fall to the dark side in the presence of Sauron because honestly, I'm like listening to it and I'm just like, it feels really good to hear him say Galadriel. I know. It's so good. I liked...

This is, again, a constant, but I'm really enjoying getting to observe it in so many different forms. His lies are always rooted in the truth. So when he's saying – we'll get back to Galadriel and her beautiful hair in a second – but when he's saying – he's kind of spinning the Celebrimbor lie, right? And he's saying –

The toll that creation has exacted from him in crafting the three and the seven has left him diminished, vulnerable to the shadow. First of all, of course, diminished shadow. Like this is pinging a lot of key, real like Lord of the Rings word cloud for us here. But he may be lying about that flaming, reeking shadow.

form being brimboards but he's not lying about the fact that this is taking a toll on him that he has proven susceptible just like later when he is manipulating him he's doing it by appealing not to a thing that has to be manufactured out of thin air but to the genuine root of the ambition that drives kella brimboard that has driven him to this point and will drive him further so that's just great to watch um

The Galadriel moment, I'm like, this show in a way that I love has me in such a fucked up headspace with the Halbrand-Galadriel relationship. I know. Which I insanely kind of continue to ship. What is wrong with me? I'm with you. I know! There are dozens of us. We are not alone here. When he's saying this, it is so irrefutably, objectively, undeniably clear that he is working on it.

merdania that he is trying to play on her very apparent attraction damn right like all right you offer me you offer to bring me a shawl can you help bring me the nine like how short can the distance between those two things be right yes the fact that

Actually, this is a question I have, because he enters as Halbrand, she sees him in that state, now he's Annatar. Kella Brimbor was the only one who witnessed that transformation into that form. Are we supposed to assume, though, that Merdania, at a minimum, forget maybe all the other smiths, but that Merdania, at a minimum, is like, I know who you were before Annatar?

You have to believe it because otherwise she's so dumb because like the wig is wigging and the makeup is good and the accent's good, but that's Charlie Vickers. So like, yeah. So in a way, I think that actually helps in this scene because then you're like, everyone was sort of like, what's going on with these two, right? With how Brandon Galadriel. And so then if he's telling you, if you're into him and you want to fuck him and he's telling you that you remind him of her, you're like,

Yes. Right? So there's that. Amen. But then there was a part of me that's like, I felt like he, even though he's working a game, meant it. Like, there was a look in his eye of like, well, if I can't have the exact thing I want, maybe here's the next best thing. And like, how can we not think of our beloved log? Knock off Galadriel? That's so sad. Galadriel Light, it is sad. It's honestly devastating. But...

It did feel present in this moment. And the fact that he made his big pitch to Galadriel and the, I see no difference and we'll rule together and we'll dominate and you'll bind me to the light. There was a draw. The draw was genuine, no matter what other thing was unfolding. When they looked at each other on that log, the thing that we felt and the thing that they felt was there. It doesn't mean other things weren't there.

But that was there. And so it feels like it's still there. And I like that because we've seen that from Galadriel, the way that he is haunting her mind. And so knowing that she is such a presence for him still too. And as you've noted, the passages in the trilogy of his eye always seeking her, that's not going to change. I know. For hundreds of years. And it makes us...

Some of us really excited to see them in a scene together again. What is it going to happen when Galadriel and Sauron are back together again? Okay. It's cool. Thank you. Exactly. It's cool to have to wait for both of those. It is. Okay. The fact that he's talking about her hair specifically is pretty fucked up. And here's why, um,

Here's some passages about Galadriel's hair specifically that are important. Like it's very famous, her hair quote, and her hair was held a Marvel unmatched. It was golden, like the hair of her father and her foremother into a mother name Indus, but richer and more radiant for its gold was touched by some memory of the star like silver of her mother. And the elder said the light of the two trees had been snared in her tresses. For,

from the unfinished tale. So she's got the light of the two trees of Valinor in her hair. No big deal. She also, as we find out later, keeps daggers in her hair. Pretty sick. Pretty cool. Also, Gimli's request of a strand of her hair in Lothlorien, of Galadriel's hair, he calls it, quote, a pledge of goodwill between the mountain and the wood until the end of days, which is an echo of the earlier rhetoric of the doors of Dorin. But just like Galadriel's golden hair. Yeah.

To say to Merdonia, you're... I'm just... It's so mean. It's so mean to poor Merdonia, who is just... Anyway, moving on. Any excuse to talk about the love story between Galadriel and Halibrand? Why, of course, we will take it. This email comes from Tim, and he says...

I think much of season one Gal and Hal's attraction is driven by what each can get from the other. This is what Mallory is alluding to. Tim writes, Galadriel forgets about him completely in Numenor until she sees him as a path to redemption. Halbran is set on continuing his smithing for power until Galadriel gives him an army. Their attraction is what they want from the other. The Greek Eros, desiring the other for your own sake.

This comes to a head on the log, phrasing Tim, when Adar has held the mirror up to Galadriel and she's seen how much her vendetta has corrupted her. Her response is a desire for Halbrand to avoid corruption. And for the first time, she's expressing her care for him for his own sake, not for what he can do for her or, as Mal would put it, do to her. Thank you, Tim.

She cares for his good, which is the Greek agape, desiring what's best for the other for their own sake. Selfless love that for Tolkien as a Catholic is modeled on Jesus on the cross. In the finale by the river, I think maybe even on the log, we see Halbrand is still driven by this Eros desire for what she can do for him. And that's certainly how he remains in the fellowship when Galadriel says his eye always seeks her.

But I think it's really interesting to think about how this one moment of loving Sauron for his own sake continues to impact Galadriel. One, as we see her in the books, and two, in the rest of the show. Gil-galadric emphatically correcting her when she calls him Halbrand instead of Sauron seems to suggest she can no longer be trusted to separate Sauron, who she instinctively hates as soon as she finds out who he is by the river, from Halbrand, who she still has a tender spot for and may still think of someone else.

think of as someone she can save i loved that fantastic tim fantastic and there's like a mirror then the way that she talks about how her own company could no longer distinguish her from the the evil that she was fighting and like the parallels they're very interesting love it meanwhile baby dsu maybe called it earlier dory jr the prince himself

hits caliber bar with an exquisitely arched skeptical eyebrow. And when he's like, Oh, there's nothing different. Maybe have you looked to the ring maker, your friend, Anna tar, who's up atop of that tower right now, sort of looming and leering at us. Is there maybe something wrong with it? Um,

stuff we got this other email from brianna which i really loved that was sort of in response to our conversation about whether or not the friendship bonds between elrond and doran could be what is protecting both of them from influence uh anatar's influence the ring's influence uh brianna wrote i want to give you both a little insight into something we call quote protective factors in the clinical mental health counseling world

strong, positive interpersonal relationships are the best protective factors, meaning something that reduces the likelihood of a negative outcome against serious mental illness, relapse, suicide, and addiction. Well, I think this is something humans have always known about relationships. We now have the science to prove that it is indeed accurate. Brianna, uh, attached a bunch of, uh, scientific studies to her email. So thank you, uh, Brianna for that power. Friendship seems very facile thing to say, but in, um,

in a story that is both a prequel that is centering on this idea of alliance, the prequel to a story that is centering on this idea of fellowship and that only together we can defeat Sauron. This idea, this unshakable bond between Durin and Elrond, I think is, I like the idea of it being a thing that is protecting them. What do you want to say about this Annatar-Celiborne war?

Maybe you're the problem in the Dwarven Rings conversation. This was remarkable to watch. As one who so masterfully manipulates metals, just be mindful someone is not manipulating you. You see daggers where there are none, and you ignore them until they are right at your throat. This is, um...

This is actually to go right from that Durin confronting Celebrimbor about are you paying attention to what's happening around you? Are you seeing clearly to this? I like that we're hitting these back to back because which conversations and moments will characters look back on with pride or regret? And what will we feel on their behalf? And Durin clocking...

that something's up with Annatar puts him in really rare company here. Whereas like this is just Brugai Celebrant Borr

The genius of us watching Sauron, literally a shapeshifter. So calling him a chameleon doesn't even feel sufficient, but the way that he is able, not just he, but his agenda can hide in plain sight like this, and that he can describe to a T what he is doing to Celebrimbor without having Celebrimbor say, maybe I should find a way to extract myself from what is unfolding here. And then we get that conversation about

about what actually happened, about deceit working its way into the ring. These are matters of spirit as much as craft. And this time we brought deceit into the process. And then he talks about the letter. The letter that we conveniently heard read aloud in this episode because it had been so long since we had thought about it. On the heels of this conversation about manipulation, this really brilliant bit of manipulation from Sauron playing out immediately, making Celebrimbor...

Making him opt in. Actively complicit once again. He's not just the passenger. Sauron's not allowing him to just be the passenger. He keeps making him put his hand on the wheel. And that is so insidious, right? It's so painful for us to watch because there's moments. It's not just one mistake. There's time after time, moment after moment where Celebrimbor...

He keeps going. He keeps going. And it's horrible. He's like admitting when he's talking to Durin, he's like, you're wrong. There's no way the rings are perfect. Get the fuck out. Don't you know who I am? Don't you know that I'm going to catch Faeonor one day? But then as soon as he's back inside, he's like, something is wrong. Like the rings are tainted.

And then Sauron leans into that with the, like, the we, right? Like, I didn't do it. We did it. So that he makes him actively complicit. And I think the spirit line was just one more thing I want to call out because this is the other side of that conversation we had

I can't remember when. A couple pods ago, a couple weeks ago, years ago, whenever it was. About, like, oh, okay, when will we see the specific particular powers of the rings manifest? This is like the soft fantasy summed up for all its brilliance and beauty, right? Spirit. Like, you put into it something that we understand on an emotional level.

level but we will never define beyond that and like that's not only okay it's probably good and so i liked that we got a moment actually in the show that acknowledged that i have a quick question for you i love that i have a quick question for you yeah do you think early on in their partnership anatar tried the your hair reminds me of galadriel line on kelo brimble

Maybe. It's definitely possible. I mean, this guy does like flattery. That was the other genius stroke here. He's like, you probably should go to Lyndon, like, right away and tell Gil that you fucked up. Because what does he know Caleb Rimbaud's response is going to be?

No, he's never going to let me look again. Yeah. He's like his ambition, his need to forge and to do something great. Not only that has an impact, but that is remarked upon by others is the driving force in his life. And it has done that so many times. Sauron has done that so many times. I can't wait to see it not work. I'm sure it will at some point, but like, like earlier when he's like, Oh, I'll just leave.

When he was down in the courtyard and still looking like Halberd, he's like, oh, I'll just go. And they're like, no, no, no. Don't go. He's like, oh, you should just go to London. Doran's called him on his shit, but I want him to be in the middle of leaving a room being like, oh, I'll just go. And someone will be like, okay, bye-bye. Bye. Great to see you. Thanks for stopping by. Can you return the shawl after you launder it, please? Yeah, thanks. You don't get to use our faulty umbrella even as you go. Okay, so...

Doran tries one more time with his dad. And I love this. What I love about this is we get the return of the collar, the reinstatement, the thing that, you know, surely Doran wanted something that Sauron himself predicted. Maybe this will be the healing of the rift between you and your father. I like the rhetoric of we hear at the beginning of the episode, King Doran asks his son for his axe. Yeah.

And he means it literally. Give me your axe so I can make a hole in this wall. So I can bang into this foundation wall. Yeah. Here he asks for it metaphorically, right? I need your axe by my side. And, you know, of course we're thinking of Gimli and you have my axe, et cetera, et cetera. Of course that's on our mind. But this idea of like, hmm.

What that means, how his loyalties are split. You know, Elrond, again, Elrond, if he ever comes back in the picture is, is going to be like, these rings are bad. Yeah. What is Dorian going to choose? Yeah.

He chose Durian in season one. Here, Disa exacts a promise from him that he'll never ever wear the rings. There's just like a lot of people pulling on him in different directions. And I'm curious to see where all of that goes. Yeah. Yeah. This was also great. The promise that Disa pulls from him, swearing, he walks in with it and she's just like, what?

She's like, oh no. Unbelievable. And makes him swear that he will never wear one of the rings and he does. And I think, okay, regardless of whether he can follow through on that vow. What I love about this is that it reminds us like what you're citing about this thing that he wanted from his father. The rings are not the only temptations and we have to remember that. People are tempted by other things too. And his father's approval and acceptance and more than that, pride.

right acknowledgement that he was his son was able to see something that he wasn't is like the dearest that's the gem that's the jewel for baby d and so of course he allows his father to put that back on his chest and walks into his home feeling a little bit ashamed but also like he got a thing he did he dearly craved like the the ring might not be the temptation for him we'll find out but this is other jewelry is exactly more of a necklace guy yeah

we should note that when we enter that scene, when we first see Disa, similar to the way we see King Doran at the start of the episode, we see her through a hole in the wall. Yeah. In snared trapped somewhere. So I'm just very, we both remain very concerned for Disa last, but not least. And then we're going to leave a Regian and the dwarves for the island life of Numenor. Um,

Caleb Berman makes a really sad speech. We heard part of it at the top of this episode. He turns on his smiths, right? Who Sauron has already been...

working their opinions of kelly brimbor but he's lashing out at them was it your hubris your sloth all of this sort of stuff um that that got us in trouble we need to redeem ourselves uh his guilt feels very very catholic to me um anatar is thrilled sauron is thrilled he gets stepping and be good cop uh to kelly brimbor's bad cop and i just love how we've gone

In the span of an episode from, like, let's just think back to the Doors of Durin party, which was just mere scenes ago. The way in which Sauron is all about fracturing, destabilizing fellowship and alliances he's done so successfully with Elrond and Galadriel, who are at each other's throats this season. Mm-hmm.

the team of Disa Duran and Papa Duran and then here with Celebrimbor and his ringsmiths who were once unfailingly loyal to him and now are the enemy and this is how he wins is division and strife so it's just probably like we haven't yet gotten to the trailer shots of Celebrimbor completely melting down but we're on

of the past and I am loving frankly every second of it like him. Did you see the preview photo for this episode on Amazon site? No, it's just like him.

his hands up just like fantastic it should be that's great I have no notes yeah the um textbook projection that is on display here my guy really needs some management training the muttering and murmuring of his team like what the

What the actual fuck? Lord Celebrimbor? And the way that, like, he is so emphatic and decisive about what he is asking them to do and what they need to do. And then quivering and falling apart the second that he goes up to his, like, like,

Brooklyn loft. It's like, Oh, I like this layout. His corner office. Yeah. Wonderful. And he can hear like, he can hear what Anatar is saying to them and surely what they are like whispering about him. And so it's all falling apart and unraveling in a way that he is again, tracking and feeling in real time. And yet it's, it's too late. Like, would you say Joanna Robinson here on house of R that sin begets sin? This is so sin begets sin. What we're watching here. Like,

He admits that they did something wrong, that something went wrong with the seven. How are you going to redeem that? How are you going to redeem the entire project? And what does the project represent? His entire life's work. His sense of worth. His legacy. The mark he's going to leave on the world. The nine will fix it. Let's just go stealth deeper. Oh, no. The nine will fix it. It'll be fine. Let's go down to Dumanor. I would love to.

And we're going to start with this doozy of a speech from our guy Farazan. Can we hear it? Have you ever seen it? Across our western seas. The white tower of Eressël. The only gateway to the undying lands. I have not. Only the keenest eye can. And only from the peak of the Meneltarma. I reckon the elves placed it there on purpose so that every sunset serves as a reminder that our days must end.

Fucking Cammon. I have not. I have not. We hate that guy. Okay. Have you ever seen it across our western seas, the White Tower of Arisea? We were just talking about this Boromir quote from the movie Fellowship of the Ring, not the book. Have you?

out of it when movie Boromir says have you ever seen an Aragorn the white tower of Icthelion glimmering like a spike of pearl and silver his banners caught high in the morning breeze etc so of course we're meant to be thinking about Boromir in this moment that's Boromir movie Boromir stealing from a book Pippin by the way yeah this idea by the way this idea of like

Taking a line someone else said and having another character say it. Peter Jackson did that all the time. That was one of his favorite moves. So, you know, something to think about. But Arisea, right? Like, what is this place, Arisea? So glad you asked.

Arisea, aka the Lonely Island. Shout out to Andy, Akiva, and Jorma. But this is, as Farazan says, the last stop on the way to Valinor. The elves live there. No men allowed. Please. Shrouded and missed in secrecy.

The main city of Arisaea is called Avalone, is how I would try to pronounce it. And Tolkien loved his British myths. And so this is the Arthurian legend inside of him jumping out with calling a city on an island shrouded in myths that men cannot get to Avalone or Avalon. We talked about Avalon a lot.

the Isle of Avalon a lot in House of the Dragon. We were talking about the Isle of Faces, another mysterious island shrouded in mist and mystery that mortal men, most mortal men cannot approach. So this is a very, this is a recurring, George R.R. Martin's done it, Tolkien's done it, et cetera, et cetera. There used to be a much friendlier relationship between Erisea, Avalone, and Numenor. But I would say, if I had to guess,

I would say it's the straight up years and years and years of elf racist behavior on Numenor that caused a strain between these two entities. I think that's a reasonable read. Yeah. Quote, even when Tar-Palantir, and that's Mariel's dad, even when Tar-Palantir took the scepter and wished again for friendship with the elves, they did not come, and Avalon was veiled in cloud out of his sight. So, eventually...

things will get so bad that the gods will be like, you know what? This island should not be in. People should not even be able to see this. Let's just snap it out. We're going to pop it into the unseen. Unplottable.

like pop into the unseen world essentially um eventually when they do that when they make the island unplottable uh you can only get to it if you follow a very specific direction which made me think a lot about lost the island on lost you have to have like specific bearings in order to get there or else you'll never find it and that's our monthly mention of lost on this podcast frankly not enough i think we can make it weekly

Anything you want to say about Arisea or this concept of the Lonely Island? I just thought that this little speech from Farazan was incredible. Just riveting. But Farazan longing for...

definitely not alarming and certainly not giving us Tom Riddle making Horcrux or Sheev Palpatine becoming Darth Sidious vibes. Like, no, nothing worrying about this at all. I thought that the on purpose line was so striking because it's not, it's like all of the alarm signs are here, right? Like, it's not just...

That he's longing for something that he does not currently possess. It's the resentment and the jealousy. So we're pairing greed and ambition, unnatural ambition, with something that makes it even fouler. Natural. The greed. So, like, this... We are just...

We are seeing the exact thing that Celebrimbor describes and fears. Like, this is the covetous nature of men. And so then it's like, as you're noting, it gives us the specific insight of Numenor and these factions glimpse into, like, what is fueling this rift between the faithful and the kingsmen. But it connects then nicely to the other character sets as well. Kemen, just a complete dipshit. I couldn't hate him more, honestly. I have not.

I couldn't possibly hit him more. He's got more damage to do, obviously, in this episode. Okay. Yeah. I find Farrah's use of sunset language intriguing, given during speech we talked about this, about pitying humanity for being shackled to the sun, right? I reckon the elves place it there on purpose so that every sunset serves as a reminder that our days must end and theirs will not. Men need to mark the passage of time in a way the elves don't. Right. Okay. Yep.

Kevin asks about the scepter. And we're going to talk about the scepter again in the spoiler section. It was, as you recall, the co-star of one of the titles of the episodes, the eagle and the scepter. They don't have crowns on Numenor. They grasp a scepter. That's how they gain power. That's the whole thing. So it's essentially he has the crown. He's got the scepter. He's got the power. Kevin's like, is that not high enough? Is that not high enough for you? You've got the scepter. Is that not high enough?

I like this contrast of the dwarves delving deep and the Numenoreans grasping upwards. Yes. Going, trying to, no one is content with the level that they are at in this world. And, you know, they're either up or down, but they're like, this, the status quo is not for me. Kevin here then does something that deeply disturbed me to my core.

which it absolutely sounded like he was about to break out into song. And I just want to cite one of my favorite Monty Python bits, uh, from Holy grail, where there's this like young Lord Ling who keeps trying to burst into song and the music swells and that his father stops him. And he's like, Nope, Nope, none of this, no singing here. This is what Kevin says. The scepter is what you make it. The age of men is upon his father. Let us take it. I was like, how is this not, how are we not breaking into song in this moment? Um,

But, Kemen, I hate you. And my hatred for you is stronger than my love for musicals. So sit all the way down. I have great news for you, which is Kemen's father says to him in the very next moment, thanks for the encouragement. Yeah. By the way, your mom always thoughts me horrible.

What's going to happen to you? She always thought you were pretty shitty. When you were at her breast, your mother prophesied that you would come to ill ends. My mother? What did she say? Impress me in the task that I'm about to place upon you, and I will tell you, fail to do so, and I shall have to find other places to make use of you. We will be circling back to this, certainly. In addition to everything that's on our minds here with Kemen and Farazan and Numenor, though...

It made me think of that Durin-Durin conversation from the penultimate episode last season. Oh, yes. When your mother bore you something inside you is ill-formed, right? And then he builds toward like the vision that he had of, I saw upon a great gray beard of an old dwarven, right? And he's like, he finds strength and encouragement in that. And Farazan is like, your mom always thought that you were going to just like suffer some great, terrible thing.

the relationship between these two is just absolutely fascinating to me. We continue to have a lot of notes for the parents of Numenor. I love, again, in Tolkien, it's always like, your dead mom who doesn't have a name thought this about you. The moms, they're all dead, including Bronwyn, and most of them don't have names. Okay. Let's go to Muriel and Alendil. I actually want you to ISO on this. This is your time to shine. Tell me what you felt about

soon to be no longer Sea Guard Captain and his not quite queen Miriel. So when I take notes on the episodes you know in a Google Doc you have like the little you can have like the outline on the side if you set like an H3 or an H2 or an H1 you can like quickly find it so I always like make little labels for each scene for myself so I can quickly navigate if we pop out of order I need to find something right and what I wrote for this one was Numenor colon Kevin and Farazan plot and scheme Oendil and Miriel somehow do not fuck.

That was like the summation of this to me and the thing that I took with it. We go to Muriel and Elendil up in the tower, listening to the townies just still chanting Farazan out of the street like fucking fanatical weird dicks. I have to imagine that Belsigar, who we...

shamefully do not see this episode he gets a mention but I have to assume that he's just been out there 24-7 like keeping up the chant for Farazan I mean I hope so because otherwise I'm like don't these people have like anything else to do

Wild, yeah. So Elendil is trying to encourage her, right? Valandil told me that in the old quarter, they're still saying prayers for you. And the sea guard, they're loyal. Just unite us and give us a charge, and we're here for you, our queen. He's not ready to give up. And she goes to him, reaches out, and puts her hand on his chest, like,

And I said to myself and then to you via text message, just move the hand down a little bit. Like, just a little bit. She does everything.

She goes from the chest to the abs. That's the journey that the hand goes on. And Mallory's like, Noah. So he's like, he looks at it and she's like, is he waiting? And then as soon as she pulls the hand away the first time, as you noted, it goes back. He's like, it just started to reach for it. Wonderful stuff. Then he says, beautifully,

It was you who opened my heart again to the way of the faithful. We swore to keep serving again. Beautiful. And then he says, now you wish to be still while the wolves are licking the cradle and everyone watching at home is like, we just want her cradle. Come on. You're so important to me, Mallory. You're so precious to me. Fun thing. Fun fact about wolves licking the cradle, by the way. Yeah. Uh,

I was like, that's quite the phrase. Is that something the writers of the show came up with? And a fun thing that happens sometimes, because we do have screeners for these episodes, so we get to watch them a couple days before other people. Sometimes you have a screener for something and you want to Google something for it. It doesn't yet exist in the wider world.

So I Googled wolves licking at the cradle and Google was like, no, nothing, nothing. This doesn't exist yet. If I Google it today, Thursday, it will pop up something to do with rings of power. But it just like was giving me nothing. I was like, that's fun. And again, it's just like fun, fun bit of language from our audience.

writers here um she asks him what he saw in the palantir before it like blew him back or whatever and we get a his vision a vision of his vision we'll talk about this a little bit more in the spoiler section um but he does have a new sword in that vision something worth noting so pay attention

Then we get this, like, I mean, he needs a new sword, as Mallory pointed out to me earlier, because he's handed over his old sword along with the rest of the Sea Guard. I'm sorry, anything else you want to say about Muriel and Elendil? I'm so sorry. You were on a roll. You were talking about wolves looking at the cradle. Anything else you want to say? I think I, unlike them, had finished. So...

No, I guess, I mean, we should talk maybe for a minute about what she says to him about the new path, right? Change to a new path. Farazan's kingship is a part of that path. And so are you, because he doesn't know yet what he has seen, but she's like, you didn't see what I have been seeing, what has haunted me. Giant wave? Right. No big wave? Okay. She perceives this and positions it.

As good news. And we've been talking since season one when we heard, you know, all of the, like, it is Numenor's future you saw, and it has already come to pass. The visions begin with your arrival conversations. Well, Muriel and Numenor, like, this is an interesting lens into this idea of, like, what is fixed, what is predetermined, what choices can you make that can potentially determine a different outcome. But also, when you start to consciously think about that,

Do you risk maybe bringing about a thing that you're trying to avoid? This is like classic. We talk about this all the time with Cersei and a million characters, right? This is like Prophecy 101. Yeah. And so, you know, we talked in season one about like the Galadriel passage or conversation with Sam actually in Fellowship, right? The famous, some never come to be unless those that behold divisions turn aside from their path to prevent them the mirrors dangerous as a guide of deeds. So I'm,

independent of any actual outcome it's like muriel is a character who falls into this mirror palantir whatever the case may be guide of deeds muriel is always thinking about what she has glimpsed or maybe what someone else has glimpsed and what that tells them about the future and that is a dominant force behind the choices that she makes and that is as that as collateral told us

a dangerous thing because you don't ever have the ability to totally understand what you're seeing or why or how any choice you or another person makes is going to inform the future. I think Palantir visions especially seem like insidious little traps. So I wouldn't give any advice based on what I saw in a Palantir, but I'm not Muriel and who we just watched completely fumble her entire birthright. So, you know,

Meanwhile, the Seaguard are being stripped of their status. The faithful, you know, Elendil's like, don't worry. Volandil says they still have your back. And...

The evilest little dipshits on the island, Kemen and Earian, in matching shitty little sashes, are here to disband the Sea Guard. And, like, the way that Earian has just, like, pivoted to full, like, Hitler youth, like...

I don't even know how to describe it. Anyway, she's just cartoonishly evil. And she's like, I wanted to tell you. And she says, like, they were going to charge you with treason. This is the compromise. I talked Belsigar down to stripping you of your entire life's work. They were going to charge you with treason. And she's like, BTW, Volandil, looking a little bit like Merdania cozying up to Annatar. She's like clutching at Volandil's arm. And I hate to say it.

I think that's why he doesn't survive the episode, because Kevin's face when he sees that is like... Yeah. They already had beef, right? Because they had the near brawl at the pub. But yeah, this felt like it sealed it. Kevin was going to do whatever he had to to take Villandale off the board. Off the board. The jealous rage on his face.

stupid punchable face as he watched that moment was incredible. I loved that Valandiel in his final moments was not tempted by that offer. Same.

what he is tempted by is rewatching dead poet society. Me too, because he gives us a full blown. Oh, captain, my captain as Elendil gives up his sword and walks away. And it's quite beautiful. Lovely. Everybody just getting in on the, the chant and the salute for our beautiful Elendil. Very moving. I, I did have, I have a note about this moment. We'll save it for a little later. We'll save it for wig watch, but yeah,

yeah speaking of maybe don't take advice from palantirs pharizons pharizons looking a little covetously at a palantir it doesn't seem great to me i mean what i would say doesn't seem like a good combination of mental state and powerful elf stone i would not mix those two personally but calamity here we are and then we come to this very sad sequence right where uh

In pursuit of new aqueducts, Kemen has decided to interrupt a religious ceremony where we are mourning our dead and it is...

uh elendil sends a little seashell off into the water and it's very clearly like his moment to think about isildur who because we don't have ravens or email in this world he still thinks is dead yeah um very moving moment but be honest what was the more meaningful seashell moment of the season for you this or kirdan shaving it was the kirdan moment yeah for sure um

didn't love this sequence personally kevin i i like to hate kevin he seems like beyond like well i guess i could see joffrey doing it i don't know it's just like when they're like give the old man his relic of the goddess of sadness who cries tears for the dead and he's like wrapped it i was like really

Yeah. What would be the harm in letting him take it? You're going to destroy the shrine anyway. But yeah, I think there's a combination of just the abject cruelty. Like he feels big and strong by making other people suffer because he can. And then, and especially when his father is like,

I'm just going to keep reminding you that you're small and insignificant and like your own mother thought you were pretty shitty. He has to like find that strength wherever he can. But this also did make me think of the, here's your bolt of cloth. Pick which color you want for your coronation. Then I'm going to steal from you a conversation between Farazan and Muriel because not just the like,

pushing red as like a symbol of embracing the future, leaving the past, embracing the future, a leader for a new age. But he, Farazan literally said like, we have mourned the dead long enough. It is time we attend to the concerns of the living. So this just feels like the family platform, right? Like it's about showing that they can bully their way to any end, but also they actually don't give a shit about these traditions and just about like decency. Yeah. Decency.

decency quick question I'm not religious but do you think rinsing the blood off the sword that you just used to stab your romantic rival in water usually used for religious purposes is that bad do you think that's not good it simply can't be good alright so Valandiel is arrested beautiful Valandiel is dead and I'm honestly devastated

Not only because he's dead, but because this fucker got to kill him? No. Okay. This just feels like an injustice and not right. And the stab in the back I can accept. Yes. The fact that he was seen to hold Volandil's head underwater for even a second is preposterous. Nonsensical. Absolutely preposterous. That was actually very weird on the flip side when Volandil just snapped his, like, collarbone and shoulder socket like a

chicken wing and he wailed and wept and screamed and surely soiled himself that was that felt right that was good that yeah that was real tyrian slapping joffrey uh material there okay olendiel calling volandiel son sad the fact that he got to like hold and cradle him and not a seal door who's still alive so it's fine as is derrick okay yeah

Some rando-el stuff to wrap things up. We've done Numenor, we've done Eregion, we've done Khazad-dum, so we are in the forest and Linden...

We mentioned Elrond running. We don't need to talk about that anymore, necessarily. Gilgalli gets Celebrimbor's letter. We mentioned that, too. As he's reading it, you hear the spooky ring theme that I'm very good at identifying now playing behind him. We get the letter proves Galadriel was wrong. Okay. And then later Elrond will run in with a ring and he says Galadriel was right. Okay. Okay.

Very confusing. Gil's ring gives him spooky visions that I thought looked absolutely insane in the context of the visual imagery of the show. I thought they were temp effects. Sorry, not to be rude, but like I did. Oh man, you're killing me today.

But the orcs are in the woods. It was such a notably contrasting visual style. It was bizarre because we've seen these horror images, like flashes before and Galadriel's like that, but not these like the rocks moving and the fish gasping and stuff like that. Anyway, we see orcs in the woods marching towards the camera, very House of the Dragon finale of them, but we've got three more episodes to go. So that's nice.

And then, so when Elrond shows up and he's like, I'm not wearing the ring, but I've got the ring. And Galadriel was right. Gil-Galad correctly says, Sauron is the architect of all of this. And quote, our armies cannot defeat both Adar and Sauron, not alone. Fellowship alliances. I was so confused by this. I'm sure I'm missing something obvious, but I found this very odd. Both the Elrond who like, as we talked about,

previously, like, issues the most withering indictment of Galadriel to date when they parted, and then he comes in and he's like, she was right? Now, like, literally right about the army marching toward Eregion. Yes, but I don't know. This felt, in terms of theme and tone, like, weird to me. But then I was just actively confused. I actually didn't understand what our guy Gil was, like, talking about or saying here, because...

But they already sent their forces to Mordor. Yeah, because of the commander who was like, the letter! The letter, so let's go to Mordor. She's been pushing the let's go to Mordor agenda for a few episodes, but like... Does he think that's where Sauron is? Yes, because they had one spy report that said that Sauron was there. But this is what I didn't understand about this, because Elrond is like, Galadriel was right.

Doesn't he mean about Sauron being in Eregion? Or just that was more Eregion being under threat? Well, I think what he's saying, we saw orcs in the woods, so Adar is on the march towards Eregion. Because Galadriel, the thing that she was saying was like, I don't think he would stay in Mordor. Oh no, Galadriel's like, Sauron did everything. That bridge, that's Sauron. The barrow is, that's Sauron. Everything is Sauron. So I'm not saying he's, I don't think he thinks that's correct. But that there's a threat to Eregion.

Okay. But who's, I mean, I don't disagree with you. I found all of this a bit muddled, but I think the idea is they think they have to fight a war on two fronts when in fact Sauron has manipulated it. So it's actually just one front. So. Right. Yeah. Yes. That's where we are. Yes. Galadriel's in the orc camp. What? What?

Gil, just like glimpsing the future and just seems very unmoored by what he is seeing. I don't know what to tell you about Gil-galad, but I do want to hear what you have to say about Galadriel and Adar. Just, you know, we're only treated to a minute of this, but Galadriel is basically unpacked from a crate and

We see, you know, like you said, they're right there. I mean, they're just, they're staring at Eregion, the orcs. She's unpacked from her crate. Adar walks in to interrupt his orc generals from trying to kill her. And honestly, genuinely, he looked great again. I was like, I can't believe it.

I thought this might be a fleeting thing, but it's not. And then Galadriel gets the upper hand and kind of like spins him, like almost like twirling him in a dance. He just like leans right into it and turns to her and is like, I brought you here not as a prisoner, but as an ally for we share a common enemy. And, uh, I shouted kiss because it was just so intimate. I,

I love you and I support you in all endeavors. And I can hang with this idea that Adar is like an attractive looking Uruk general. The hair was gorgeous again. What do you think that smells like? That's my question to you. How do you think his dental hygiene is?

So fair question and a good note. However, we did hear canonically in this episode from Redania that Sauron smells like reeking death. Yes. So, you know, who's smelling great right now on the brink of war? Okay.

Okay, so Adar, if you are any, just a single step below Wreaking of Death, you're in with Mallory. All right, and that does it for our deep dive. We're going to end it there. We've got wig watch and a spoiler section to do. I'm really excited for a wig watch today. I mean, I always am, but I'm particularly excited today. Let's just roll right into it. Let's do wig watch. Will you wear wigs?

Okay, we mourn Volandiel's curls. We celebrate Elrond's wind-tousled curl. Just extraordinary stuff from Rob Arameo, and I actually think that's just his hair. Looks great. Elendil, hear me out. Wait, hear me out, okay? An extremely handsome man.

I would love to see, I don't mind the shape of the wig. I would like to see a few strands of silver in that hair. This is a very, he's just like, I've got a very weather beaten face and the contrast between his face, which is handsome, but has seen some things. And the like, just for men quality, deep Brown of his hair is throwing it off for me. And I'm just like, put some silver in there. And I think we're set. Okay. Let me tell you something. I know you're with me now. Yeah.

If they do that, I don't know if you should let me pod. Like, I have a career to protect. I thought you were going to say that it's, like, too voluminous and clean, which I was prepared to agree with because, you know, this is the Aragorn comp of, like, he's never hotter than when he's saturated and fucking filthy. Well, he's about to head to jail, so let's see what happens to the wig in jail, shall we?

And then it's important for me that you all know that, yes, Mallory sent me a photo of Muriel rubbing on the pecs and abs of Elendil. That was her contribution to our text chain this week. I sent her several zoomed in photos of the Annatar wig hairline this week because it was...

I feel like they keep changing the wig and the one they had this week was very special. It's a very high widow's peak, but the peak itself, which is I think what you call the pointy part at the bottom, that's the peak, right? Was squared off. I don't understand what was happening at all. Charlie Vickers, exquisite. Doing a great job. I like the blind wig. I like how it gets a little tousled. I think it's great.

The hairline continues to baffle, honestly. So that's all I have to say in wig watch. Should we zoom through some spoilers? Let's do it. You've heard of the last alliance of Elzenmeth. Can I interest you in a pre-alliance alliance?

I just want to shout out something that we haven't really talked about, which is like, clearly the sack of Regian is around the corner, right? The orcs are at the gate. The wolves are looking at the cradle. The orcs are at the gate. If only. If only. And I just want you to know, because we're like, where's our Elrond and Durin moment? Yeah. This is what I want you to know from Unfinished Tales. Quote,

Elrond would have been overwhelmed at the sack of Ravian, but the host of Sauron was attacked from the rear for Durin sent out a force of dwarves from Khazad-dûm. Yada, yada, yada. Elrond gets away. Yada, yada, yada. Establishes Rivendell. Yada, yada, yada. Sauron tries to take his revenge on the dwarves, but quote, the gates of Moria were shut and he could not enter. So two things I'm excited about. One,

doran saving elrond's ass at a reggae and i think that's gonna make me cry and two the doors of more the doors of doran being shut in sauron's face maybe if he paid closer attention at the party he could have gotten the password from narvi but i don't think he did and it's a word he doesn't it's a word he uses often friend but he doesn't know the meaning of so yeah truly i love it yeah i've been holding on to

that little tiny moment in one of the trailers, like I need your ex. Exactly. And that's what I want to note. Doran saying, give me your ex. And I need your ex like twice in this episode. And then Elrond's going to show up and be like, I need your ex. Yeah. Yeah.

Okay. I love it. Nori and the Shire. This has nothing to do with today's episode, but I've been sort of like perseverating on it to use a favorite Malorubin word since last week's episode. So this idea that Nori will leave the Harfoots and the stores to the Shire and found the Shire is very much like, we love this idea as Nori's purpose. But thinking about Poppy sort of cozied up with her new boyfriend, not Rufio, and like, will...

that's the Sam comp. So then Nori has always has been the Frodo comp. Frodo saves the Shire, but not for him. So my question to you, Mallory, is like, if they found the Shire, do you see, does this show end with Nori happily ever after in a hole in the ground? Or does she not get to have that? It's devastating to contemplate, but I think I'm in the same place. It feels like that's what we're heading toward. And that will be

The joy and the tragedy of Nori's story. Going out into the world and finding a new appreciation for the things she had and a desire to root that and protect the people that she loves and give them the ability to feel safe and to feel like they have a place that is their own. And then to not get to share. That's going to be crushing. I hope they hang a little acorn on the door in her honor.

On her behalf. Okay. Nori. Let's talk more about your guy Elendil. Yeah. And the Elendili. The Elendili is the name of like, it's another word for the faithful because he said like Elendil means Elfred, right? So Elendili is just like the name of the group of the faithful. But it is also like sort of what you refer to as the people who leave Numenor with Elendil. And so he will take the faithful with him off Numenor before everything goes to complete shit there. Yeah.

And this, oh, captain, my captain moment, like very much underlines this idea that there are people who will follow Elendil off the, to a different continent entirely. A couple of things he takes with him when he goes. Some Palantir, Narsil, a new sword. We're going to talk about the vision in a second. But he takes the scepter with him. And I just really like how much they're underlying, like how important the scepter is to, uh,

is to Farazan and guess who gets to keep it? It's Elendil gets to take the scepter with him to the new world and it will wind up in that creepy little Elendil museum that Elrond has at Riverdale. Like along with the shards of Narsil, the scepter will be there. So yeah. They, you know, we've talked since the beginning of the series about how

there was a lot of excitement and anticipation for Numenor. It hasn't always been the most successful aspect of the show. Yes. I think we're getting to a stretch where like they are setting, they are really doing a good job of setting up the future of these characters. And we have like our mystery, right. And our intrigue and our theory fodder with like,

Well, I'm assuming the thing that Kemen's mom saw was him becoming a ringwraith. Like, that just feels like even more fuel for the theory fire there. But, like, that Farazan sequence, the longing and the covetous need. I mean, the Numenoreans have long lives already, and he's like, it's not enough for me. Sauron being like, why don't you just go?

Why don't you just go attack Valinor and just take immortality for yourself and then everything going to fucking shit? They're doing a really good job of preparing us for that. And of course, what you're saying here with Elendil and the people who are loyal to him, not because they're told they have to be, but because they actually believe in him and they have a shared reputation. Something shared and sacred in their lives that feels like an orienting principle they can all exist around. Yeah, they're doing a nice job with that.

His vision, Elendil's vision is him on horseback with Narsil riding away from a smoking, you know, temple on the hill. And this is the shrine. This is the...

Sauron shows up and he's like, Farazan, I'm your prisoner, no problem, but have you thought about worshipping Morgoth? And have you thought about sacrificing some burnt offerings to Morgoth, maybe? They start with the sacred tree, they burn that to Morgoth, but then they start burning people. Cool shit. It's fine. Don't worry. It's totally fine. Very low of light. Once we start burning people, that's when Elendil's like, time to go, I think. It's time.

to go. I do want to preview something that we might see in season three. If season three of Sauron comes to Numenor, this is what we might see. Quote,

The Kingsmen believed him to be a god and obeyed him without question. So I'm really excited to see what Charlie Vickers' Numenor Thunder Lightning wig looks like. It's going to be a good time. And that's what we can look forward to. Last but not least. Ring Wraith Watch 2024. Mm-hmm.

So when Sauron's talking about who gets the nine, he says, quote, wisest, most noble, purest of heart from Numenor to Rune. Nine ring bearers from the nine greatest mortal kingdoms, which is what we've been tracking anyway. But this is what our listener Mindy says.

I was thinking about Ringrave Watch, and I'm wondering if the show will go... This is a follow-up on our dwarf question. I wonder if the show will go to the trouble of actually introducing all nine of them. That is a lot of characters, and the show really doesn't have a lot of time to do this. As you said in your mailbag, they can't even show the way the rings slowly take them over. So is it possible that they may just show us...

the Numenoreans, maybe one from Rune, and yeah, maybe Theo or someone else we know. Is it necessary for the storytelling for us to know all nine before they become the Ringwraiths? So where are you sitting with that, Mallory? This feels obviously of a piece with the conversation about the seven, but this feels more important to me to get right. I'm glad you made the point you made about, like, frankly, the show not

Like, having the impulse that I just voiced, and, like, the dwarves are the least important of that group, because that's not how I feel about, like, that's a character set I love spending time with, but in terms of the role the Nazgul play in the story, and more broadly than what the weakness and fall of man represents, like, I'm...

This is high on the list, I think, of the things they have to nail. So we have to be invested in multiple characters here. I don't know if that means we need to know all nine, but we've got to get, I think, a pretty big chunk here. This feels like it could be more equivalent to what's happened with the elves, where Galadriel is one of the protagonists of the show, one of the genuine main characters. Then you have...

Gil Gallad, who's been in the show a lot. He's a regular. But as you've noted, we actually haven't spent a lot of time with him or gotten a lot of meaningful time with him. And then you have Cureden, who basically walked into the story and immediately had to write. So I think there could be something similar playing out across the nine, where a few of them are characters we've really spent time with, and a couple of them are ones we've met before.

And no, but like don't really feel invested in. And then some are just like, here you are. You have a ring now. I agree with the email. Like there's not time to do full immersive arcs for all nine. There just can't be. But I don't know that we're going to have all nine rings assigned by the end of the season. That would actually feel too quick.

me. Do you think that's going to happen? No, I don't think not this season at all, but I still don't even know if we have room in even two more seasons to give us the number of mortal men we need to be invested in. So... Yeah. Yeah. Kevin, though, seems high on the list, and I gotta say, they're not sending their best people if they're sending Kevin to be a ringwraith. It's not great, but...

The prophecy from his unnamed dead mother does seem to indicate that. Okay. On the Theo beat, though, we got this interesting email from Jean-Pierre. And we talked about this a bit as a theory in season one for other characters, but...

We're putting it on Theo now. Jean-Pierre says, Theo, he thinks Theo is the king of the men in the mountain who swore an oath to Isildur and did not honor it. And Isildur cursed them to not rest. Pause from Jean-Pierre's email if you've only seen the Peter Jackson films. That's the green ghosties in Return of the King. Resuming Jean-Pierre's email.

This is done so well in my opinion. Theo says to Arandir, quote,

Hagen will die so Estrid can be with a seal door and at that time the future men of the mountain will bind themselves to the Numenoreans swear an oath to always be there for a seal door then oops we actually used to serve Sauron and we can't really fight him we will flee so I think this is I mean I think especially that line I promises to keep my own is like very good fodder for this idea of Theo as the ultimate oath breaker in in Tolkien and Lord of the Rings um

But this idea, the reason they break their oaths is because they are secretly in service to Sauron. Yeah. It's hard for me to see for Theo, but Theo doesn't know that Halbrand is Sauron is something that I think is worth noting. And like fatherless, motherless Theo interacting with Halbrand, who he thinks is the king in the south, the south and king they've been waiting for is something I'd be interested to see.

I like that too, because if we think back to that, I thought surprisingly powerful stretch of story between Galadriel and Theo, then like that was already very poignant. But everything that she said to him, what she was able to, when she was able to encourage him where she was warning him, was born out of her own experience, including with Halbrand.

and even though she did not know the truth at that point right but just like when you allow like a thing to consume you in full upholding Finrod's quest the pursuit of Sauron etc so for Theon to have Theon? Theo to have for Theo to have some sort of um

connection to Sauron without really understanding that, that that's what's happening, and then have another parallel to the Galadriel there would be interesting to me. I agree that the I Have Promises to Keep was like real, oh boy, Oathbreaker, Harbinger, Men of the Mountains, Sirens going off stuff. I have actually no interest in trying to like argue against that. I'm compelled by it. The only thing for me here is like,

Why make the character so young then? Like that feels... Yeah, well, I mean, he's going to be looking 30, I think, by the time we get to season four. That's true. I think that I am also not interested in arguing against this. I think it is a really compelling theory. I think the only thing that would disappoint me is Theo is currently the candidate I'm most interested to see his journey from who he is right now to potential ringwraith.

No one, Kemen, I don't give a shit. And like, you know, the randos out in Rune, who cares? So like the, but the potential like tragic seduction of Theo into Ringwraith hood, but you could still get something similar if, you know, if he falls under Halberin's thrall and that. I do think I have promises of my own to keep and his,

relationship with Isildur, which we saw suddenly seems very important over the course of two episodes. I think that's interesting to think about. Yeah, absolutely. And the way he was looking for purpose and understanding and belonging. The Lord of Polaria. And you know what? I'll undermine my own question about why make him so young then because I think you could spin that as

It's ultimately more interesting if like different types of people at different points of their life are susceptible to the same yearning. And so like, it's not like they should all be like 37, you know, though. I think you're right. He might look 37. Okay. That does it for us. We did it. We like this episode of television. Yeah. Three more episodes to go. We're calamity. We're, we're devastated.

We have a lot of people to thank today because it takes a fellowship. It takes an alliance of elves and men and dwarves to put this podcast together. So thanks as always to Steve and Jomie, the incredible work that they do and have always done. We have this extra video component, which just takes a village. So we want to thank Cameron Dinwiddie for his work on this episode, John Richter for his work on this episode, T. Cruz for video supervision, and Arjuna.

who's not only like producer extraordinaire who we love, but also is doing like video stuff for us now. So Arjuna Rickle Pal at all is free time. Thank you so much, Arjuna. And we will see you all next week for witches and penguins and rings. Oh my. Bye.