Why does Tolkiens desire to create unbearable mary sues always get in the way of a threatening villain?
After reading the Silmarillion and the other related media, I'm starting to think Tolkien can't finish a proper arc at all.
>>48142087
Because Tolkein wrote his books for his children?
>>48142124
He must've had some autistic children.
>>48142087
>Lord of Balrogs
>killed by a spiky helmet and Hobbit: BoFA tier physics
>another balrog just thrown off the cliff and dies
>Melkor beaten like a bitch about 5 times before finally dying to a human mary sue stabbing him through the heart
>Sauron get blown out repeatedly, then blown out even more in middle earth
>"Threats"
>Melkor finally has a hard fought victory against an army of mary sues
>Daddy Tolkiens Self insert personally comes down to retcon the whole continent out of existance
Seriously, the less you know about the setting the better it looks.
>>48142087
Because at the end the world is still in decline and with every age gets farther away from what Illuvatar had planned. At least you get some "unbearable" Mary Sues to slow down this process a little.
>>48142087
Problem is not with Tolkien but with modern fad of grayness and allergy to goodness and heroism.
>>48142139
Just one I think.
>>48142087
>fingolfin
>blonde
lol
>>48142087
>unbearable mary sue
You mean like Fingolfin who was brutally killed by Morgoth and thrown to the wolf pits because he thought they'd lost the war and was stupid enough to challenge him one-on-one, or Feanor who died because of his own pride never managing to get his hands on a single silmaril and dooming all his descendants to the same fate, or Hurin who got kidnapped by Morgoth and forced to sit on a chair seeing his family's ruin for several decades, or Turin who actually caused the downfall of several kingdoms from his sheer stupidity and the curse on his family before unknowingly making his own sister pregnant and killing himself (after his sister also killed himsef), or Bilbo and Frodo who sustained so much damage to their souls from being ring-bearers (which they only could do precisely because they were completely mundane on every way) the only way to cure it was to get them to live in the Undying Lands for the rest of their lives?
>>48143007
herself*
>>48142087
Ha ha! You read the Silmarillion.....pffffft.
Sorry, what was your question again?
>>48143007
In fact, the only of Tolkien's heroes who get a unambiguously happy ending are Beren, Luthien, Aragorn, Elwing, Gimli and Sam. Not even Earendil since he didn't want to be on the Undying Lands and only became an elf so he could stay with his wife
>>48143007
>like Fingolfin who was brutally killed by Morgoth and thrown to the wolf pits
who maimed a god*
and who's body was saved by the King of Eagles*
and like every Elf was resurrected in the Halls of Mandos*
>>48142087
>then he took gondolin but a gorillion balrogs and dragons died to sharp helmets and angry humans
bravo tolkien
>>48143262
Making seven tiny cuts before managing to stab him on the foot before being literally torn apart isn't all that dignified for what then was the high king of the Noldor
It's literally stated that nobody celebrated the fight or made songs in Fingolfin's praise
>>48143324
>tiny cuts
Morgoths wounds never healed and he had great pain.
>>48143363
So like scars an old veteran has when the weather is bad? Let's face it the pain part is Morgoth's own fault for making his home a shithole with bad weather.
>>48143381
the pain part is so that tolkien can make melkor seem as vulnerable and non-threatening to his kids as possible.
>Melkor, mightiest among the Valar, almost beaten by an Elf
I bet if the hpund that gave Sauron the knot was on hand, he'd have fucked Melkor too.
>>48143363
That's less Fingolfin and more a running theme with Morgoth. He chose to be the one edgelord who took a scary shape when all the other Valar took beautiful ones, and became unable to take any other ones. Just handling the Silmarils burnt his hands so badly they blackened and never healed. Corrupting something permanently spent some of his power. After the War of Wrath the Valar cut off his legs and chained him on the Void
>>48143395
>almost beaten by an Elf
>By dmaging one ankle
Fingolfin made a great showing, but he never came close to beating Morgoth. The fact he wounded him at all is a testament to how good he was, but he was going to lose no matter what.
>>48143395
The message of the Valar to Feanor after he leaves has this bit on it
>Vala he is, thou saist. Then thou hast sworn in vain, for none of the Valar canst thou overcome now or ever within the halls of Eä, not though Eru whom thou namest had made thee thrice greater than thou art.
Feanor is stated over and over again to be the greatest among the children of Iluvatar, so it's pretty safe to say Fingolfin couldn't have defeated Morgoth. The only being seen to be able to match a (severely weakened) Morgoth in a physical fight was Tulkas, who's pretty much the warrior god
>>48142087
>I'm starting to think Tolkien can't finish a proper arc at all.
Well he never finished writing Silmarillion, his son did
Fucking Roman's with their Hercules Mary Sue
Fucking Babylonians and their Gilgamesh Mary Sue
Fucking English and their King Arthur Mary Sue
Fucking Beowulf
Fucking Achilles
Fucking Moses
Fucking Krishna
Fucking Ali
Why can't ancient cultures write a decent mythology without so many self insert Mary Sues?
>>48144147
>Gilgamesh
>A mary sue
The name you want is Marduk, buddy
>>48144147
But those ARE the worst their respective mythologies have to offer. Storytelling DID evolve dude, we don't have to keep reading ulysses over and over again now.
>>48142087
There's quite a few finished "arcs" with Tolkien each with quite a few stories on it
>Ainulindale
>The years of the Lamps, the Spring of Arda
After this Morgoth becomes the first Dark Lord of Middle-Earth. This is actually the longest time period in the setting, but the Ainur don't really tell the younger races much about it
>The Two Trees, the coming of the Children of Iluvatar
>The Wars of the Jewels, the tale of the Children of Hurin (which you can actually read on a full-length version as a separate book, Children of Hurin), the Fall of Gondolin, the Voyage of Earendil and the War of Wrath
After this is when Sauron becomes the Dark Lord
>The Downfall of Numenor
The rest is on the Red Book
>There and Back Again by Bilbo Baggins (the Hobbit) and The Downfall of the Lord of the Rings and the Return of the King by Frodo Baggins (Lord of the Rings)
Then there's The Adventures of Tom Bombadil which is a compilation of hobbit poetry and folklore in-universe, also in the Red Book
>>48144617
I forgot the Lay of Beren and Luthien which is actually the longest individual story on the Silmarillion
>>48142087
To be fair, the book is unfinished, Tolkien died before he could finish. His son looked over his notes and pieced together what he could, it's no surprise that the arcs jump around and the continuity is all over the place.
Also
>Fingolfin
>A Mary Sue
>Not a leader learning from his mentor's mistakes and sacrificing himself to buy some time for his people.
Yeah, stay the fuck away from best elf.
Tolkein also writes from a judeo christian perspective where the defeat of evil is inevitable and just a matter of assured time.
>>48142087
What are you even talking about? The bad guys "win" in the Silmarillion. All the kingdoms of good are destroyed.
Do you mean the Valar? They are Morgoth's equals, and there's more of them. Its clear from the start he couldn't overthrow them alone, much less Iluvatar.
>>48144147
>Gilgamesh
Hercules murdered his wife and children in a fit of rage, then cheated on his second wife, which led to his death.
Gilgamesh was downright hated by his citizens, was defeated in combat by Enkidu and his end is all but mary suish.
One of the oldest versions of King Arthur has him murder all the infants born recently to avoid the birth or Mordred.
Achille was a fucking diva.
Moses stuttered.
>>48142087
>>48142145
>judging an author's writing ability by the frankensteined abomination his son assembled from dozens of manuscripts never intended for release but published anyway to make a quick quid
wew m8
>>48142145
>Lord of Balrogs
>killed by a spiky helmet and Hobbit: BoFA tier physics
The Lord of the Balrog was killed by Glorfindel, not some Hobbit...
Glrofindel in turn died too. Before that said Lord killed his way through Gondolin.
>another balrog just thrown off the cliff and dies
Happened to two of them, they always took their killer with them.
>Melkor beaten like a bitch about 5 times before finally dying to a human mary sue stabbing him through the heart
Were did you get the human from?
Melkor wrecked Arda forever. The whole of Valinor had to intervene twice to defeat him. They managed to banish him from Arda, that's it.
>Sauron get blown out repeatedly, then blown out even more in middle earth
First age: Boss gets defeated - Sauron manages to get away.
Second age: Sauron gets btfo by Numenor, in return corrupts Numenor and makes them suicide. Also wrecks Eregion.
Weakened by a last ditch effort from Numenorean survivors, dwarfves and elves.
Third age: Wrecks Arnor, almost wrecks Gondor, via the rings wrecks Erebor, the grey mountains and Khazad-dum leaving the dwarves with the iron mountains and lesser holds in the blue mountains.
Ultimately gets defeated by an last ditch effort + not looking for those damn hobbits.
I'd say he had a good run.
3/10 got me to answer. Now read the books feget.
>>48143080
Tour also got a fine ending.
Was made into an elf, got the girl, being awesome.
>>48144928
>The Lord of the Balrog was killed by Glorfindel
no
>not some Hobbit
Hobbit:BoFA tier physics, involving an Elf (Ecthelion) using his spiky helmet to impale the Lord of Balrogs and throw them both into a well where they drowned.
>>48143276
The exact number of Balrogs is never stated.
In early writings it's a high number, latter versions set them at less than 10.
also
>Gondolin
>humans
There was 1 human in Gondolin - Tour.
>>48144780
> Moses stuttered.
With a boss that incompetent it's kinda unsuprising.
>>48144983
Still no Hobbit.
>>48145030
I never said there was any hobbit involved you mouthbreathing retard.
>>48145066
Please, never post again.
>>48145106
Eat my booty hole;
Balrogs should have been more than just cheap plot bicycles
>>48145487
They only are a plot bycicle on LotR, unless you count whipping Ungoliant so that she doesn't eat Morgoth plot advancement. That's the most relevant time they're mentioned, besides the fall of Gondolin
>>48142087
Why is Fingolfin blonde?
>>48144576
The point is that Tolkien tried to create a mythology for his language, and mythology is full of "Mary Sue" characters who are just superheroes that always win despite most logic. He didn't set out to write a contemporary novel.
>>48145023
Moses had two settings with nothing in between.
> Em, eh, meh, feck.
> AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH-
>>48143975
And this is the thread.
>>48144780
Everybody stutters one way or the other, so check out my message to you.
>>48142915
Thank you.
>>48142145
I get that this is bait, but in case anyone else is reading this and gets confused:
>>killed by a spiky helmet and Hobbit: BoFA tier physics
You realize this was from a ~1916 draft of The Fall of Gondolin? Back when elves were half the height of humans and Sauron was a giant evil cat?
>>another balrog just thrown off the cliff and dies
No, I don't think this happens in any draft. Maybe you're just misreading it.
>>Melkor beaten like a bitch about 5 times before finally dying to a human mary sue stabbing him through the heart
Once again, old drafts that didn't make it into the final version for a reason.
>>48144983
I assume you also think dwarves are always chaotic evil, and refer to Feanor and Fingolfin as "gnomes"? Since you're treating first drafts as authoritative canon.
>>48144576
>Storytelling DID evolve
And got worse because of it.
>>48144780
Tolkien was perfectly aware of this. He was a philogist who worked as a university professor, and his writing reflects mythological heroes. Some examples of his work are translations of Beowulf and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. His characters are not any more Mary Sue than the ones you mention are, the problem is that almost nobody in this thread realizes this and just agrees blindly to go on a tangent about how the culprit is Christopher (which is a frankly stupid argument when we wouldn't have access to anything but LotR and the Hobbit if it weren't for him, who already had a say on the writing of Tolkien's work when LotR was being written)
>>48148858
To be even more clear (just what I can fit in one post)
Feanor is responsible for the destruction of the sacred swan-ships of the Teleri (which, to drive the point home, is later described as "the rape of their ships), the first act of murder of elf by elf on the Undying Lands (done so that he could steal said sacred ships), the exile of the Noldor from the Undying Lands (guess why), the Wars of the Jewels (even after he died, what ultimately fueled it was that his sons were literally incapable of NOT going apeshit if there was any chance of getting a Silmaril by doing so thanks to the Oath he made them take), the near extinction of the Children of Iluvatar in Beleriand and the slavery of those anywhere else (due to instigating the Wars of the Jewels), and the permanent loss of much of the little beauty left in the world (thanks to not giving the fucking Silmarils to the Valar while he still could, which would have made it possible to resurrect the Two Trees). Much of the same can be said about his descendants
Hurin's G R E A T idea of charging into Angband by himself got his whole family cursed. After being released several decades later, his reputation was ruined since everyone took him for a traitor and didn't even recognize him anymore. If it wasn't because of him Morgoth couldn't have ever found Gondolin. He kills himself by jumping into the ocean
Turin was for a time the leader of a company of bandits, killed his mentor Beleg, was indirectly responsible for the death of the last petty-dwarves left in the world, caused the destruction of Nargothrond and made everyone who was left in his hometown be hunted like animals by the Easterlings because he thought he could just go kill their leader to free them. He also took his sister as wife and knocked her up after Glaurung made her forget who she was. When told the truth he sperged out, killed the guy who told him and then killed himself. He also was responsible for the first murder on Nargothrond
>>48142087
Tolkein's boner first everything getting worse over time pissed me off more than his tendencies to sperg out over Catholicism and good vs evil.
>>48142087
They're based off of shit like Beowulf. Have you ever read Beowulf? Dude fights a inhumanly strong monster that's terrorized an entire town without any weapons because the monster doesn't use weapons. And ends up ripping the monsters entire arm off like he doesn't give a shit.
>>48144576
You ought to keep reading Ulysses over and over, you probably didn't appreciate Joyce enough the first few times. You probably meant the odyssey, but you should be reading that over and over too, because you obviously haven't read any classical literature, and it shows in your horrible opinions and blatant lack of knowledge of what you criticize.
>>48149387
Beowulf once almost lost a swimming contest because some leviathans were trying to start shit, so he chased them to the bottom of the sea, beat the crap out of them for three days until they all died, then finished winning the race. He did this in his full battle gear, because only a shitty, unmanly swimmer would do somthig like not wear maile when swimming to Finland.
>>48142145
What the fuck do you want us to tell you? That Balrog killed all the heroes and dominated the world and everything was terrible?
Because you're bitching about villains losing, and that's just pathetic.
Also you're forgetting Tolkien was all about the great being defeated by the small. Or did you think Smaug being slain by a single tiny arrow was not intentional?
>>48149387
Grendel was a draugr, the only way you can hurt a draugr is if you beat them in a wrestling match.
>>48149332
Why? It's one of the most prominent, uniquely European theme in storytelling.
The past was great, the now is comfy but not as good as what was.
>>48146342
>always win
>the one example you provided in your OP had the hero lose
>>48151314
But anon, heroes can't be heroic, they must be Byronic dark men that must battle the DEMON WITHIN only to suffer against the DEMON WITHOUT.
>>48151567
Well fingolfin kinda had that, being only relatively more stable than feanor, and then he went and died in a fight with the literal Demon Without. And while heroic he was still a rebel against the gods that matched his people across the arctic to go conquering.
>>48151751
Turin, on the other hand, fits perfectly
>>48142087
>mary sues
That's not how that term is used.
>>48142087
Read Kullervo. I just read it and I was going to do a review on it, but basically it's about an ugly, vengeful, angry demigod going around killing people who piss him off and raping his sister.
>>48145072
You need to write more understandably. Also, you need to be at least 18 to post on 4chan. See you in six years!
>>48142124
He was not called Tol Keen, but Tol key en.
That's why it's spelled Tolkien and not Tolkein, or Tolkeyn or Tolkolkadoodledoopdazowbob-ien
>>48143395
Damn that's some rad art. I love the stuff that's produced depicting all those ridiculous mythological moments in Middle-Earth's history.
I bet you faggots would not hear of the king going to the iron hill to make time stand still, and praise your him after he falls https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3aB6CPyO0Ww
Wew lad, fuck my spelling by the way
There's not a single mary sue in Silmarilion though.
I feel like most people bitching about >muh good elves vs ebil orcs get their knowledge of Tolkien from George RR Martin or something.
Elves are far worse in Silmarilion than orcs-
>>48142087
In the foreword for one of the Lord of the Rings editions he explicitly states that he just wanted to write a very long story. I don't think arcs were his concern.
>>48157514
Problem is people are using Mary Sue term not even knowing what it actually means and slowly turning into a meanless buzzword that soon will lose any worth and reason to be treated seriously. Which is a pity because that was useful term
>>48142145
This map is BS, Beleriand weren't that big, it was more or less the size of Eriador
>>48147394
I don't remember correctly, but if it is published version, screaming REEEEE CHRISTOPHER GO NOT CANON isn't very reasonable.
Still, I don't really see any BoFA-tier physics in this, or any particular relation to physics at all
>>48158000
>I don't remember correctly, but if it is published version, screaming REEEEE CHRISTOPHER GO NOT CANON isn't very reasonable.
It's not in the published Silmarillion. It's not in the publlished anything except for the Book of Lost Tales, which is literally Christopher saying "hey, look at all these weird first drafts my dad wrote ages ago, aren't they bizarre"?
>>48158000
>I don't really see any BoFA-tier physics in this
An Elf driving a spiked helmet into a balrog and throwing both into a well is actually almost the same shit that happened in Battle of the Five Armies when dwarfs start head butting orcs for whatever reason
