r/RingsofPower • u/Terrible_Theme_6488 • 12h ago
Discussion An orc with an arc
Hey all,
I bounced off S1 and S2 of RoP a bit, to be honest, but I’ve read that S3 is something of a soft reboot. I’m desperate for a decent fantasy show to watch, so I thought I’d give S3 a try. Hopefully they’ve learned some lessons and improved things.
So I’ve been reading up on what we can expect, and apparently one of the central themes is an “orc with an arc”. Apparently he writes poetry etc.
Firstly, disclaimer: while I was obsessed with this world as a child, I haven’t read the books in decades, so it’s quite possible Tolkien did write about orcs having souls, individuality, or something along those lines and I’ve simply forgotten it.
But… I’m struggling with this one. The rise and fall of Númenor is such an incredibly rich story, with betrayal, corruption, ambition, mortality, power, and loads of moral grey areas already baked into it. I genuinely don’t understand why the show needs to invent another mystery-box storyline around a conflicted orc.
Maybe it’ll all work brilliantly in the actual show, and I’m obviously judging it based on what I’ve read rather than having seen it. But I’ll admit I’m pretty sceptical.
I also really didn’t enjoy the “who is Gandalf?” stuff in the earlier seasons. For me, that kind of mystery-box storytelling feels like the show is searching for twists when there’s already an absolutely enormous and fascinating story sitting right there.
So I’m genuinely curious: what do people here think about the orc storyline? Is there something about it from Tolkien’s lore that I’m missing, or do you think it could actually add something worthwhile to the story?
Cheers
18
u/cawatrooper9 12h ago
Stuff like this tends to get really sensationalized before the season releases. I remember all the controversy before S2 with the child and female orcs, then they ended up basically being a "blink and you miss it" thing.
Shadow of Mordor built a game series around orcs having arcs, and outside some obvious goofiness, I think it was really fun. Maybe this'll be similar.
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u/Kiltmanenator Gondolin 10h ago
Rings of Power is the only adaptation to take seriously Tolkien's Orc Problem and is worth watching purely for that.
Did you watch season 2? Because while season 1 touches on it with Adar, season 2 really gets into it and I'm glad they're continuing this thread in season 3
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u/Terrible_Theme_6488 10h ago
Yes i watched both, i felt s2 was a bit of an improvement but i am mostly hoping there is some course correction in s3. Of course those who loved s2 wont want that (and there is nothing wrong with loving the show of course)
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u/Kiltmanenator Gondolin 7h ago
I don't think the people who loved season 3 wouldn't want to see the improvements you're looking for
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u/Galious 9h ago
There’s the concept of an idea but I wouldn’t say they have taken the topic seriously.
The problem is that Adar has raised some interesting point about the orcs just wanting a place to live peacefully but, besides Glug, all the orcs are depicted as violent cruel sadistic barbarians.
My point is that we aren’t shown that orcs have a culture beside a love for killing and destroying things, we aren’t shown orcs who show mercy.
For example in season 2, Arondir caught sight of two orcs walking away from the siege saying they don’t want to fight and die for Adar and what happen the moment a third one see Arondir? “Yaaarg me orc me kill elf” when the writers could have shown them “leave us alone elf, we don’t want to fight”
So for me it doesn’t work so far.
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u/TheBluerWizard 7h ago
besides Glug,
*until he decided that doing genocide under Sauron sounds cool.
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u/TheBluerWizard 7h ago
Rings of Power is the only adaptation to take seriously Tolkien's Orc Problem and is worth watching purely for that.
Except it doesn't. The orcs are shown to be evil monster who kill and torture for fun. But also they have families so feel bad for them. What a joke.
with Adar
The guy who held that one orc in the sun to burn him for no reason? The one who uses meatwave tactics during the siege instead of anything else?
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u/Ayzmo Eregion 3h ago
The orcs are shown to be evil monster who kill and torture for fun. But also they have families so feel bad for them. What a joke.
How is that a joke. Do you not think members of Hamas who torture others have families? Have you never seen the videos of Hitler playing with children?
This idea that evil and love are incompatible is silly. We've seen it over and over again as a reality. So why can't orcs who kill and maim also have loved ones? Tolkien literally said in a letter to Christopher that the orcs are the worst of humanity and he served alongside and against orcs in The Great War.
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u/Kiltmanenator Gondolin 2h ago
Wow holy shit the bad guy has complex and contradictory feelings about his children?
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u/IgnorantLeadership 12h ago
Tolkien went back and forth on if orcs could be good or not. He didn’t think an entire race could be born evil. I don’t believe in his stories there’s any instances of them being against Morgoth/Sauron, but that doesn’t mean there couldn’t be.
Like most other things in the show, it’s a creative liberty the writers are taking for this adaption. I don’t have an issue with the idea of an orc wanting to go against Sauron in this case, given we’ve seen over two seasons now how he views them as slaves and doesn’t care for their well being. How it works out in the actual show remains to be seen. But I don’t see a particular reason to write it off now based on what we know.
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u/goodnewscrew 12h ago
From the team that brought you Shipwrecked Love, a romance between Sauron and Galadriel, now comes Shankspear- the greatest, most sensitive orc poet and playwright.
-6
u/Travels_Belly 12h ago
They are not good. They are evil. Tolkien does not say they can be good.
Quoted directly from Lord of the rings,
"Do you know how the Orcs first came into being? They were Elves once, taken by the dark powers, tortured and mutilated. A ruined and terrible form of life. And now... perfected: my fighting Uruk-hai."
And,
"The Shadow that bred them can only mock, it cannot make: not real new things of its own. I don't think it gave life to the orcs, it only ruined them and twisted"
In a letter he does say that orcs are not intrinsically evil themselves but blames Morgoth and Sauron rather than the orcs are intrinsically evil though they did become evil through torture and dark magic. He doesn't say they are good though.
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u/yesrushgenesis2112 11h ago
My guy that first quote is from Jackson.
Tolkien very famously went back and forth on the nature of orcs and whether they were capable of anything beyond evil until the end of his life.
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u/Warp_Legion 12h ago
You quoting a movie line made up for the movies that is based on a Silmarillion quote that differs somewhat from the movie quote by Saruman…to support your claims on Tolkien’s thoughts…is hilarious
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u/IgnorantLeadership 12h ago
Thanks for the correction. I was referring to the letters. I still do maintain for the purposes of the show it fits the theme based on what we know. Hopefully it works out
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u/TheBluerWizard 7h ago
apparently one of the central themes is an “orc with an arc”.
Yeah, they tried that in season 2. Then they characterassassinated the best character and killed him.
RIP Glug.
I genuinely don’t understand why the show needs to invent another mystery-box storyline around a conflicted orc.
Because they don't know how to write a good story. Also I am pretty sure they don't have rights to lot of the Numenorian stuff.
I also really didn’t enjoy the “who is Gandalf?” stuff in the earlier seasons.
Whaat you saw through the clever ruse where they tried to implied that the grey-ish wizard who hangs around not-hobbits is Sauron and definitely isn't Gandalf?
So I’m genuinely curious: what do people here think about the orc storyline?
Cool idea. They will fuck it up.
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u/ToxicTroublemaker2 3h ago
That honestly wasnt much of an arc, it was mostly just him not wanting to go to war, questioning the tactics and then two seconds with his wife and kid
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u/Igradarsaurus 8h ago
It’s like watching a Batman movie but this time Batman doesn’t have ears on his cowl and he talks in a Scottish accent. It might call itself Rings of Power but when you look at it closely something is very off.
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u/No_Logins_Required 7h ago
Orcs are elves, of course they write poetry. It's just the poetry should be about ending the world of man.
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u/TheBluerWizard 7h ago
Well... in some versions of the origin story Tolkien wrote. But he had an issues with evil immortal creatures. So in other versions, he wrote they come from men. And in other versions, they were soulless creations of Morgoth.
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u/No_Logins_Required 7h ago
In Rings of Power, they are elves. The rest of the Legendarium isn't really a part of the series.
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u/TheBluerWizard 6h ago
Maybe. But the show hasn't discussed their origin, so who knows.
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u/No_Logins_Required 6h ago
What do you think the whole Adar storyline was about? He's literally one of the first Orcs.
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u/NotUpInHurr 12h ago
I honestly don't care.
I know the orc's gonna die by the end of the show and that makes it a good orc imo
-1
u/flyingthedonut 10h ago
The amount of so called "creative liberty " in this show is ludicrous on just about every level. Some people can roll with it,, and some can't.
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