Lord of the Rings - The Problem with Sauron - The Greatest Antagonist Never Seen

Рет қаралды 2,124

Күн бұрын

Making a Villain - The problem with Showing Sauron
Sauron is an interesting antagonist. If you compare him to the modern antagonists, Thanos, Hannibal Lector, Anton Chigurh, Freddie Kruger, Darth Vadar, Itachi, the main difference is that we never really see Sauron. The most we see him in the movies is when he fights against the combined elves and humans and Isildur. But that's in the first movie. From there on, for a combined three hours that's the last we see of him. In the books, I can't remember a description of him beyond the lidless eye.
It's hard to think of or imagine another villain with so complete or ominous a presence, yet never comes on stage. There's no evil dialogue, no triumphant laugh as Aragorn and the remnants of man go out and march on the black Gate. In their last attempt to give Frodo a chance to destroy the ring or simply die together before the might of Sauron.
Because it's actually how little we see of Sauron that makes him truly unique. He's a villain without a face. A presence without a body or voice. What this does is simply let the reader imagine and wonder what kind of being Sauron is. It's a trick stories use because almost always what the audience imagines is often better than any definite answer. Think of Lost or any other mystery where there was a grand mystery that seemed utterly inexplicable to the audience and we'd watch each episode trying to imagine and fit what answer could connect all these pieces together. Then the answer comes and it's a dud. Now you likely couldn't get away with having a mystery story and then never explaining it, but there are stories that try to dangle that and let the audience imagine fill in what could have happened.
It's one of the greatest aspects of Lord of the Rings is how the world feels so vast and real that i would spend hours imagining what could and would happen in each of the far corners of the mp. Who lived in the Blue Mountains. What kind of people or creatures lived in Rhun? What were the lands of the Haradrim like or the corsairs? All these mysteries left unanswered allows the audience to fill in the gaps. It's a tough point to build because it requires the audience to fall in love with the world and story to the point where they are imagining their own adventures just to live in middle earth.
This is the problem if Sauron. Because everything the audience has imagined for all the years since is going to feel better than anything that a TV show can come up with. This is the tricky part that the writers are going to encounter. How do you create a character around this faceless omnipresent evil? Making him human will lower him, and make him seem more ordinary. He's just a guy. And if you make him have reason and logic and humor, this faceless evil is completely pulled back.
The physical appearance and character of Sauron we see on screen is going to heavily impact how we imagine this antagonist. It could ruin it or explain how such an evil could take power. This is the danger that any writer comes to if they try and put such a villain on the screen and give him dialogue.
I couldn't find the artist for the image, so if you know please post it below and I can credit it properly.
I found it on screenrant.com....
Music by Simon Swerwer,
Cuggin's Cove,
Emergence,
Inith and Od Travel North

Пікірлер: 14

@AlaskanGlitch 3 күн бұрын

In order to understand why Sauron is depicted the way he is in the movie you need to understand Sauron's history. Sauron, like Gandalf, is a Maiar. He is an immortal being and as one of the Ainur (Valar and Maiar) that sang Arda (the world) into existance, they have the ability to take any physical form they desire. Sauron in the Silmarillion changes his appearance several times. It was also Sauron under the fair guise of Annatar, the Lord of Gifts, during the Second Age when he taught the Elves how to make the Rings of Power, which is how he got the title of Deceiver. Everything changed for Sauron during the downfall of Númenor in the year 3,261 of the Second Age, because he was there and it destroyed his physical form. After that he was no longer able to take a "fair form." When Sauron was separated from his One Ring by Isildur he became incorporeal again and his spirit fled east for 1,000 years. He was able to regain physical form once again when he took up residence as the Necromancer in Dol Guldur in the year 1,000 of the Third Age. He would have appeared taller than men, but not grotesquely large, maybe 7 to 8 feet tall. He would not have had a fair appearance, but the books did not go into much detail about Sauron's appearance once he fled Dol Guldur for Mordor. The movie depicts Sauron as a flaming, lidless eye. This is incorrect. That was Sauron's symbol - a lidless eye wreathed in flame. Just like Saruman's symbol was a white hand. It is not how Sauron actually appeared.

@fantasywind3923 3 күн бұрын

In the books we can feel the presence and influence of Sauron even when he's not directly present...though some of his thoughts and perspectives are sort of given to us by proxy, he is more 'present' per se in other works where his direct actions are shown (Silmarillion etc.) the adaptation problem is that they rarely get the true epic and scale and give proper perspective of such a being, a divine entity, a spirit of unimaginable power a lesser god of sorts! Such power and might is rarely ever shown properly on screen, the physical depiction in the show was lacking because they made him quite.....ordinary, instead of having some aura of menace and power, glorious appearance that is awe inspiring etc. Villain whose ,machinations are so overwhelming and on vast scale is hard to pull off, especially with the wriitng that is not very smart! Tolkien is able to do it painting great picture with the words he uses! Even Morgoth is pulled off wonderfully by Tolkien...like his conversation with Hurin...it's glorious scene :) in book. Obviously a touch of mystery is also needed as the villain who is mysterious also adds to the imagination!

@geoffcassidy9981 3 күн бұрын

I agree with the scale problem. It is definitely hard for any adaptation to capture which is why I think most have either kept Sauton in the background or limited screentime or had issues. Rings of power tackled this head on without taking the necessary steps to prove to the audience that Sauron is more than a really powerful and sneaky dude. Also sounds like I need to reread the Silmarillion as it's been a long time and I don't remember their conversations. Thank you for your insight. Appreciate the comment.

@fantasywind3923 3 күн бұрын

@@geoffcassidy9981 the words of Morgoth and Hurin are actually more in The Unfinished Tales, and Children of Hurin. It's really well written scene. As for the show well one thinks that with all the modern possibilities they could have depicted Sauron in much better way...the actor being given some 'CGI enhancement' or such, special effects that would make him seem greater, more beautiful (elves as well...the casting choices for most of the elves character in amazon show were....questionable). But what was truly needed was Tolkien's vision, the writers of Amazon were really bad at their job when they invent stuff on their own.

@mjshorty101 4 күн бұрын

The Lord of the Rings risk game is quite awesome actually lol, as long as you take out all the timed ring mechancis

@geoffcassidy9981 4 күн бұрын

Yeah we never played with the ring. Just turtled until we almost used all the pieces in the game then attacked each other. We had no idea of strategy.

@GrandArchPriestOfTheAlgorithm 16 сағат бұрын

Sauron isn't the main antagonist of Lord of the Rings, the ring is.

@geoffcassidy9981 12 сағат бұрын

I agree and disagree. The way I see it is that the Ring is so much a part of Sauron that you could say it is the antagonist, but that would be stretching the definition for me. I disagree because the Ring by itself while corrupting doesn't play as great a role as Sauron by himself. Even without the Ring Sauron was about to destroy Gondor and Rohan and from there likely send raiding parties north. Thank you for your thoughts! I appreciate the comment and watching my video.