The Eagle would be like Galadriel in the movie, and want the ring for himself so he’d dump Gandalf and Frodo in Mt. Doom and fly off with the ring.
/like.
I was looking at a Tolkien wiki earlier today that makes the same mistake. They’ve not read page 263 of* The Hobbit* either.
Doesn’t Aragorn, while poking around Orthanc after all the excitement has died down, discover a casket (possibly made by Isildur) that seems to have been designed to hold the one ring?
Whether the casket has any abilities I don’t know
You forget the Will of Sauron, not to mention the Nazgul. If Sauron focused his Will on you- you stop dead in your tracks. Only a few of the Wise could overcome this.
Next- the flying Nazgul would have fried Eagles for dinner.
Finally, would even the Eagles have the willpower to drop the Ring? Pretty much, only Sam* & Bilbo did so. And Gandalf really pushed Bilbo and was astonished that Bilbo could do so. Frodo was unwilling to do so. Isildur couldnt do it even with Elrond and Cirdan urging him to do so.
- Likely due to the fact he’d only had it for less than a day.
There is a part in HOME where it’s discussed the refurbishment of Isengard. They find a horde of treasures, the Elendilmir (fancy circlet with diamond) and a chain with a box which may have been Isildur’s. There’s no mention of any special property of the chain or box.
IMHO, this proves just how weak the sensing powers of the Nazgul are. There Frodo is with the Ring, maybe a few hundred yards away from the chief Ringwraith, and at worst, the former Witch-King says to himself, “there’s something funny going on, I can just feel it in the air,” but shrugs and goes on. And this is just outside of Mordor, in probably the most corrupted place on its borders.
Tru dat, but they’ve got to be pretty damn close.
So it’s less a matter of Sauron or the Nazgul being able to detect the Ring, so much as noticing the Eagle in time (Sauron) and at a time (Nazgul) to bring their powers into play.
See above.
Remember, there wasn’t a ‘the plan.’ There was only the way things worked out.
On another issue, I must remind everyone that in advance - at the point where one might have planned - nobody, not Frodo or Sam, not Gandalf or Elrond, knew that Frodo was going to be unable to throw the Ring into the Fire, that it was going to take Gollum biting off Frodo’s finger and taking his victory dance over the edge and into the Fire, in order to defeat Sauron.
Sure, you can’t duplicate this exceedingly lucky break in the Gwaihir Taxi plan, but you can’t plan for it upfront in the Frodo and Sam Walk to Mt. Doom plan either. Suppose everything happens the way it happened in the book, except Gollum doesn’t fall in? The Nazgul fly to Mt. Doom, retake the Ring from Gollum, and it’s game over.
Gandalf may have suspected something, like as he said “Gollum may have some further part to play in this…”
Bored of the Rings handled that rather well.
[QUOTE=RTFirefly;18104627.Remember, there wasn’t a ‘the plan.’ There was only the way things worked out.[/QUOTE]
No, this was the plan. It was discussed at the Council of Elrond and planned that way. That’s why they didn’t send Glorfindel as one of the fellowship.
I read an interview from a more modern author (C.S. Frieden) years ago where she was talking about sorcerers/magic users in a fantasy universe. A point she brought up is you need a really convincing reason for why these persons do not rule the world, because in a real world in a fantasy setting (i.e. roughly Middle Age technology) people with strong magical power would in fact rule the world, unless you can come up with some plausible mechanism as to why this wouldn’t be.
Gandalf for one, we have no inclination he could lay waste to Sauron’s entire army, and I don’t just mean the very small portion of Sauron’s armies that the resistance in the books fight, but the entire army in Mordor–which is noted as being far, far larger. But we have no inclination Gandalf could lay waste even to that small piece of Sauron’s army. Gandalf is powerful, but he’s not a God. Additionally Tolkien goes to pains to explain that powerful figures like Gandalf cannot safely carry the ring, because temptation would lead them to just become a new Sauron. Otherwise in stead of the Eagles, why not just have Gandalf magick his way into Mordor an destroy the ring himself?
Lots of fantasy novels have magic users that can throw magical attacks vast distances, and they still need armies. Typically there are limitations, using magic makes you tired. There are limitations to the scope of its use–for example maybe you can fire a lightning bolt 2-3 miles away, but not 5,000 lightning bolts. A few lightning bolts will upset an army, but certainly not destroy it. We don’t know the parameters of Sauron or even Gandalf’s magical powers because Tolkien didn’t create a world in which those things were fully fleshed out, but there’s no reason to assume that Sauron can’t use magic at considerable range or that just because he can, it means he’d need no army.
In the old game Masters of Magic you could cast spells with a global scope, but you couldn’t destroy entire armies. I think we can assume there is at least some logic to character’s actions, and the fact that Sauron built an army suggests he needed one. But there’s no reason to assume he can’t attack at considerable distance with magic.
I mentioned earlier: Gandalf was in danger from a band of goblins and wargs in The Hobbit. When under the Misty Mountains, his advice was “Run!” When in Moria, his advice was, “Run!”
Able to lay waste armies? Entwash!
The reason they didn’t use the Eagles was that it was ultimately a test from Eru. The world had long been the Dominion of the Elves and that time was ending. The Elves were going to the West at long last and if Men were to inherit the world and bring about the 4th Age and beyond then it would have to be earned. *Men *had to vanquish the final Evil of the Old World. The Powers were not cruel. They would offer advice, in the form of the Istari (Wizards), and the Elves could assist, but the victor would have to be Men.
The powers of the Rings were to amplify the characteristics of the holders. The Rings given to men made them desire power. The Rings given to the Dwarves made them desire riches. The Rings given to Elves made them desire stasis. The Elves Rings were used to preserve their areas of the world without change. Even Gandalf’s ring was used to “fire up” those around him to do great deeds. They were all made through the knowledge of Sauron, so when he made the One Ring, he imbued it with his own power and was able to control the others. Dwarves turned out to be indomitable and the Elves removed their Rings while Sauron possessed the One. The primary power of the One Ring was just as the others. It amplified the nature of the possessor.
There’s a running gag in LOTR. Hobbits are little concerned for the wider world and largely keep to themselves. They care about home comforts and foods, their own genealogies and gardens. Frodo, Sam, Merry and Pippin are the first to really travel the world and whenever they run into someone, that person might have heard of the existence of Halflings, but they have no tales or songs of them. This lack of ambition is what makes them perfect for bearing the Ring. What is it going to amplify? Or even if it does, it will take so long to do so, they will be near enough to where they need to be to destroy it.
Once the deed is done, the Eagles and Gandalf come to rescue Frodo and Sam as an acknowledgement from the Powers that they succeeded and the world is now the dominion of Man.
Yes, upon smashing the stone bridge and preparing to destroy the balrog, his advice to the others was to fly. Also, he called them fools. I remember it well.
When he was actually on the battlefield, it sure looked to me like the enemy army got dazzled and dazed by Gandalf and coup-de-graced by the suddenly-we’re-not-charging-into-set-spears good guys.
Destroying the Ring by Eagle delivery should have been ruled impossible by Tolkien, and is a plot hole, but doesn’t bother me much. Big complex books are going to have plot holes.
–The Council has Frodo put the chained Ring in a tiny box attached to a 20-foot chain.
–The eagles are summoned (they’re really very helpful creatures) and carry
Sam or Pippin or some brave ignorant volunteer up to 15,000 feet dangling the boxed ring below.
–Cruise to the Mordor border and power dive to the caldera. The volunteer lets go of the chain.
Yeah, it’s not very sportsman-like, but the chances for success are infinitely greater than sending hobbits through Mordor. The Ring really doesn’t call out to Sauron very loudly. The Ring really isn’t very resourceful – it couldn’t get out of a river for a long time.
It’s a plot hole, but pretty minor to me. (I’ve always been more bothered by the dark riders getting driven off by a few people waving torches at them.)
That would be the most boring damn book ever written. And I’m including the works of Milton Friedman.
The OP has specifically said he’s talking about the books, you seem like you only want to discuss the movies.
Did you happen to notice the army of horsemen backing him up?
Yes, he dazzled the enemy with a flash-bang, and then he rode into combat with his sword. He maybe killed fifty Uruk in that battle. Alone, he might have gotten ten before they cut him down.
This is pseudo-medieval warfare: lone warriors are impressive – Richard the First had a penchant for wading right into the thick of things and killing Saracens by the dozen – but the real value of prominent figures is in leadership. Gandalf led Eomer’s division to battle.
Think of a mighty wizard as an artillery piece. Damn fine thing to have on your side, but it won’t win the battle for you by itself, and it sure as hell won’t “lay waste an army.”
You have a point. After all, my larger point is that Sauron With The Ring can get cut down by one guy in the movie – and tackled to the ground by two guys and helplessly looted by a third in the book – so I’m of course willing to reconsider whether Gandalf could dazzle plenty of enemies who get cut down en masse, and then dazzle plenty of enemies who get cut down en masse, and then dazzle plenty of enemies who get cut down en masse, and et cetera, and et cetera.
I’m still hesitant to agree that Gandalf would’ve been dropped in personal combat as fast as Sauron With The Ring went down – I can’t rule out that he’d keep taking huge swaths of the enemy out of the fight in sequence – but you make a good argument.
My favorite example is Teddy Roosevelt at San Juan Hill.
Instead of giving the command, “Charge!” he said, “Follow me!”