Dissecting The Rings of Power's Failed Mystery Box

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About this video essay:
An analysis of mystery boxes, plot twists and big reveals in Amazon’s The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power.

Chapters:
00:00 Mystery Boxes in the Rings of Power
02:18 Why Gandalf shouldn't have been a mystery box
07:26 Rewriting the Harfoots storyline
11:04 The problem with Halbrand
13:15 Rewriting Sauron
19:11 Final thoughts

Listen to my podcast, Cinema of Meaning:

Further Reading:

Music:
Tony Anderson – Oyarsa (feat. Timbre)
Jesse Brown and Katharine Petkovski – Embers at Dawn
Alicia Enstrom – Reflections
Hannah Parrott – Sacred Rhythm
Inola – Glacier feat. Young Collective

Additional Music:
Naski – Fall

[LikeStoriesofOld]

Ok I'm done talking about the Rings of Power now, next up is some proper cinema; a discussion on one of the most enigmatic and (to me) fascinating European directors. I've already been working on it for a while and it should be out later this month!

[albertotensai]

Out of all the poorly executed things about the Sauron mystery box, Galadriel has to be the worst of them. She never suspected anything, never bothered to question things happening right in front of her, until the very end. When she was finally suspicious of Halbrand, she confronted him. She confronted –alone and armed only with a measly dagger– the being she suspected to be the Evil Lord, who she had been hunting for hundreds of years, with no plan and no back-up. And afterwards, she just dismissed the whole thing with next to no consequences for her or the plan the elves were carrying out.

I think that the "big reveal" happened in some elven back-alley because this was supposed to be a big reveal for her and her character, not for the entire world. But nothing happens to her, she doesn't change, she doesn't repent, she continues to be the same callous person she was. It's terrible.

[TheBeird]

I guessed he was Sauron as soon as he said “Appearances can be deceiving.” Apparently I wasn’t alone

[alexparadi]

I think one of the issues with the Stranger is that him being Gandalf doesn't really matter to the show - it's only the audience that cares about Gandalf one way or the other.

[fantasy]

For some reason, I never even realised that I was suppossed to try to solve any mystery boxes. "The Stranger" was an obvious Gandalf for me and I never spared it another thought and I had no idea I was suppossed to look for Sauron, given that he had already been shown as a 3 metres armored monster.

[RexusprimeIX]

You know, for how much they were trying to show the Wizard be good, but often failing, and Nori convincing him that he's a good man. I legitimately thought that it would be a fun twist if once the Wizard finally learns to speak—at the end of the series—we thought the whole time he's Gandalf, but then he utters his name "I am Saruman".

[barbarapearce]

As a die hard fan of the lore, I had thought Halbrand would be Sauron from episode 2, but I was really hoping I'd be wrong and they'd make him the witch king instead. They were being so obvious with the Sauron hints that I thought it must be misdirection. Was super disappointing that they were just being that straight forward the whole time.

[SoVeryMellow]

they definitely subverted my expectation when they reveal that this galadriel is the same galadriel from the LOTR. Man, all this time I thought she was just some elf name galadriel.

[julialincoln-stefan]

Your retelling to the point when Galadriel puts the knife to Halbrand's neck and Mount Doom erupts gave me goosebumps

[housewyfe]

I absolutely had *chills* when you rearranged the main storyline between Galadriel and Sauron.

That moment of realization versus Mount Doom’s birth is…absolutely mind blowing.

It’s insane to think this isn’t the original show. I’m calling for some kind of fan edit; like ‘Northwest Passage’ for Twin Peaks, or ‘Star Wars I without Jar-Jar’ - with this arrangement of the reveal.

It’s almost unbelievable how a simple rearrangement of the timing creates an actually effective story.

[musicjunkie]

My issue with him being Sauron was when he wasn’t on screen with other characters, he didn’t act like how Sauron would act. Like why was he so concerned with stealing a smith’s credential and to start forging things? I get that he was a smith apprentice as a Maiar, but he wasn’t obsessed with it. And he seriously considered staying in Numenor. Why? If he wanted to stay there and sew discord, then why when Galadriel called him out the last episode did he make it seem like his plan the whole time was to go back to middle earth? And how did he end up in the sea right on a collision course with Galadriel? Too many serendipitous things have to happen for this plan to make sense and if this all was an on the fly plan, then the dumb luck just goes through the roof

[TruckeeDoggo]

A lot of YouTube channels publicly predicted that Halbrand was Sauron after the very first episode. The rationale reduced to, “ok, you have this white male, who’s handsome, dashing, heroic, and not effeminate or weak. Therefore, he’s obviously the bad guy.” They were right

[avikchari]

Loved your alternative story for the Sauron reveal - letting him create Mordor would have been so much more intense.

[TheCrimsonPope]

Damn, your reimagination of the Gandalf arc genuinely moved me. There was so much potential in this production. The fact it's been wasted so terribly is outrageous.

[CrniWuk]

Just something to ponder about, I think, is the interesting fact that Tolkien apparantly was not very fond of what's called "Mystery Boxes". Which doesn't mean that he rejected Mystery alltogether. But he was usually very uppfront in his story telling, the characters their goals and motivations. He mentioned for example that he despised allegorys.

[etilworg]

The real problem is that the writers never read about "How write characters that are smarter than you"

[NidhCthon]

The reference to Galadriel's temptation and line-for-line take from the book/movie scene when Frodo offers Galadriel the ring felt so unearned in this show. It's a shame, but I think even Tolkien knew some of his work was best left as history/fable instead of living enactment.

[fromawritersperspective]

What you're referring to is J.J. Abrams' mystery box, which he talked about during a Ted Talk 14 years ago. Funnily enough, the showrunners have worked under J.J. Abrams and even got this job thanks to his influence. So that should explain why this show feels like it paces the same way as Lost does.

[TheRolvaag]

I am still baffled how these show runners with almost zero credits to their names were able to helm a billion dollar franchise. Apparently JJ Abrams made a call on their behalf? If I were an exec and JJ Abrams was vouching for someone to take a giant franchise like this I would be looking elsewhere for writers given his handling of the latest Star Wars films.

[-l-]

your retelling of Halbeand’s story was gripping. that was really well orchestrated sequentially for a big emotional payoff that I felt even in the brief overview you shared with the existing shots. both Galadriel and Halbrand would have seemed much more responsible for the climactic events.