Things aren’t looking so good for one particularly important figure in the J.R.R. Tolkien mythos, but it will make for great television if The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power follows the path laid out by The Silmarillion.
Rings of Power fans, if you don’t want things possibly spoiled for you, this may be a good time to stop reading because unfortunately, we may be the bearers of bad news. Unless you like dramatic death scenes, then we bring tidings of great joy.
George R.R. Martin may have cornered the market on unexpected character deaths, but J.R.R. Tolkien can deliver the goods when the time comes. Everyone remembers Boromir being littered with arrows before dying in The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. There may be an even more graphic death coming in ROP, and it’s no throwaway character, either.
In the series’ second episode, we met one of Middle-earth’s most famous elves, the legendary craftsman, Celebrimbor.
The guy was born to be a smith; in Tolkien’s fictional Sindarin language, Celebrimbor translates into “silver hands.” He was basically born with a hammer in his hands. When we met him in Rings of Power, Elrond celebrated him as the greatest of all the elven makers, and just being at his side was an honor. He was a bona fide elven celebrity at that point, and Elrond treated Celebrimbor as if he had the Midas touch.
The thing about being such an expert craftsman is that word of your skills spread far and wide over the millennia. That isn’t limited to the nice people and creatures of Arda, and Sauron the Deceiver knew of Celebrimbor’s deeds. From watching the amazing prologue to Fellowship, you know the story of the titular Rings of Power. In fact, we can look forward to seeing the actual forging of the rings, which is an extremely important moment in the entire saga.
And it was Celebrimbor who made those mythical items.
If they’re so evil, why would Celebrimbor build them in the first place?
Disguising himself and using the name Annatar, which translates to “lord of gifts,” Sauron convinces Celebrimbor to create the mythical rings, which would prove to be the downfall of essentially everyone in Middle-earth. This makes Celebrimbor one of the most pivotal figures in all of Tolkien’s mythos as his unparalleled craftsmanship set in motion all the events leading to Frodo’s quest to Mount Doom in The Lord of the Rings.
Before you throw Celebrimbor under the proverbial bus, understand that he and the other smiths of Eregion were tricked by a god-mode manipulator. To Celebrimbor, Sauron appeared to be a fellow elf. The Dark Lord professed himself to having been sent by the Valar themselves in order to share his knowledge of jewelry making with a specialty in rings. Who could say no to that? Sauron wanted to craft the famed nine rings for men and seven for the dwarves. Celebrimbor, being the overachiever that he was, decided to make three special ones for the elves.
Unbeknownst to Celebrimbor, Sauron was also doing some secret arts and crafts activities. He made the most powerful of all the rings. It was so powerful, in fact, that by wearing The One Ring, he took control of the other magic rings as well as control of their wearers. As Tolkien poetically put it:
Three Rings for the Elven-kings under the sky,
Seven for the Dwarf-lords in their halls of stone,
Nine for Mortal Men doomed to die,
One for the Dark Lord on his dark throne,
In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie.
One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them,
One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them,
In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie.
While Sauron wore The One Ring, he then gained control of the Rings of Power, all except for those made for the elves. Since Celebrimbor made those without Sauron’s influence, they didn’t figure into the Dark Lord’s plan. Although a bit too late, Celebrimbor learned of Sauron’s scheme and refused to give him the rings. When you’re the Dark Lord and someone says no, you know what you have to do: launch a full-scale assault with an army of orcs, balrogs, and trolls.
With that, Sauron laid siege to Eregion and captured Celebrimbor. During the events of Lord of the Rings, we only heard tales of the Dark Lord’s cruelty. There’s a chance that Rings of Power could show us how evil he truly was. He tortured Celebrimbor into revealing the locations of the nine rings for men and the seven made for the dwarves. However, no pain, no matter how unbearable, would force him to divulge the whereabouts of the elves’ three rings. He died without giving away his last secrets, which was a victory in itself.
Not one to gracefully accept defeat in any fashion, Sauron decided to make an example out of Celebrimbor. Filled with arrows, Celebrimbor’s bloody and mutilated remains were hoisted onto poles. Using the dead body as a banner, Sauron’s army paraded Celebrimbor for all the elves to see. No doubt, the sight of a legendary figure being waved like a flag as an invading army laid waste to the region would be a demoralizing tactic.
Of course, this would also work against Sauron and his forces. No doubt, having Elrond’s friend and idol tortured to death and his body put on display to mock the elves invigorated the future Master of Rivendell to fight to his last breath.
Is it guaranteed that Celebrimbor will suffer the same fate in Rings of Power as he did in the Silmarillion? Not necessarily. Odds are, we will see Sauron capture and torture the mythical craftsman. However, Amazon might choose to tone down the gruesomeness of it all, particularly the sight of him being used as a banner. At the same time, it would make for a captivating and disturbing visual like nothing we have seen in any of the LOTR movies.