One thing that always struck me about Saruman’s death is how unglamorous it is… I don’t think the movie barons would really like to see a fairly influential character die in a burst of maybe thirty seconds as he’s walking away.
POSSIBLE MOVIE SPOLERS BELOW!
Lessee if I can find a cite for the Scouring not being in the movie…
pokes around the deep places of the internet, finding fouler things than orcs
Well, this is frustrating. I remember reading about a conference or a convention of some sort that Peter Jackson was at a few months back (after the release of FOTR), where the question was asked of how he would deal with the Scouring of the Shire, and Jackson’s answer was that he wouldn’t - the Mirror of Galadriel scene in FOTR was instead intended to be his homage to that part of LOTR. Is this ringing any bells with anyone else? It was reasonably big news on all the nerdy movie news sites, back when it happened.
This has all been backed up recently by photos, posted over at www.theonering.net, of the official Orthanc model/toy/action playset (or whatever it’s meant to be). It appears to show Saruman impaled on a spiky wheel at the base of his tower.
Incidentally, some more stills from The Two Towers went up about a week or so ago (and I’m sorry I’m not providing links to these photos, but theonering’s search engine doesn’t seem to be too effective), showing Smeagol, in hobbit form, fishing with his “friend”. Presumably this occurs in a flashback, perhaps when Gollum explains his past to Frodo and Sam at some point. And what a greasy, evil little hobbit he looks like, too.
Well, impotent in what way? They were Morgoth’s baddest boys, back in the day.
In Tolkien’s world, a divine being must externalize/make physical his/her power in order to use it in the real world. So, on the one hand, this makes you terribly powerful in the physical world. But eventually, you get kind of spent, and are pretty much constrained to the physical world. Hence, Morgoth expended so much of his native power to empowering his minions, etc., that he lost the ability to change his physical form. Similarly, Sauron got himself beaten up enough and had to create enough new bodies that, in time, he lost the ability to assume fair shapes.
So with the Balrogs, they intentionally poured their power into making themselves incredibly PHYSICALLY powerful and frightening. But doing so constrained them greatly, so in a greater sense they became “weaker” than other maia.
Well, they were just spirits that chose to ally themselves with Morgoth early on. So they’ve been hanging around Middle Earth itself for a LONG time.
The Wizards, on the other hand, remained with the good guys in Valinor right up until the Third Age. (Although there is some mention that Gandalf–Olorin–walked among the elves, unseen, before then and lightened the hearts of the elves with happy thoughts, daydreams, etc.) Then the Valar basically said, “OK, Sauron’s getting out of control. Any volunteers to go and whip up the kids to kick his ass?” So Saruman and the Blue Wizards, IIRC, volunteered straightaway, while Radagast and Gandalf were added to the team at the urging of specific Valar (I don’t remember which ones). I seem to remember that there was an implication that Saruman thought from the start that Radagast was totally incompetent and should never have been sent (made clear in his references to him once in M.Earth). And Gandalf, meanwhile, didn’t want to go at all. He was terrified of Sauron, but the Valar (Manwe and Varda?) really wanted him to go, so he reluctantly accepted the burden.
So, no, Balrogs are not really the equivalent of Wizards, except for the fact that they are both Maia and both the foot soldiers of their respective Valar.
toad, it’s answers like that that make me love this board 
Another question - before his death, did Gandalf actually kill the balrog? Also, why hadn’t it decided to leave Moria earlier? I mean, couldn’t it have done an incredibly large amount of damage to the forces of Good?
Yes, Gandalf did kill the Balrog.
Why didn’t he leave earlier? It’s dangerous out there! Look what happens when he pokes his head out just a little–BAM! Killed by some old guy and a bunch of midgets.
Remember, the last time he was above ground (presumably … I don’t know his previous vacation itineraries or anything …), the VALAR themselves had just walked into Middle Earth and beat the living crap out of Morgoth, and killed damn near every lesser being. Sure, he cleaned the dwarves out of Moria, but that small realm was probably about all that he could handle without drawing too much attention to himself. (Look where trying to take over the world got Sauron.)
Yes, but if Sauron without the ring was just another evil Maiar, wouldn’t the Balrog have been equally powerful?
Well, not all Maiar are created equal. Just as Morgoth was in origin Melkor (He who arises in Might) the greatest of all the Ainur, so the Maiar had relative strengths. Sauron was the mightiest Maia corrupted to Melkor’s service, and long benefitted from his direct tutilage, in addition to his native strength as a maia of Aule. Tough combo. The balrogs were originally spirits of fire who turned away from the Flame of Anor to serve the dark fire. Bereft of Morgoth, they had less native strength to fall back on. IMHO.