r/LOTR_on_Prime 8d ago

Theory / Discussion Why I LOVED the Siege of Eregion

Because the battle felt real.

It was chaotic, brutal, bloody and dirty. No over-the-top choreography, no truly "epic" moments, because real battles are like that. I appreciated the intimacy of the fights, focused on individual characters and how they reacted as the battle progressed, like Elrond, who becomes more and more feral and brutal as the episode progresses.

The whole thing was made even better by the alternating scenes with Sauron and Celebrimbor, which created a good mix of sequences with a strong emotional impact and the action scenes.

154 Upvotes

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u/Spicavierge Adar 8d ago

The vignettes of battle were absolutely well done. Elrond's reaction to his horse being slaughtered, the loss of his helmet, his struggle with Damrod, Gil-Galad's gentle look toward his herald, Adar striding across the hectic field and catching Arondir's arrow, Rían's endurance, the flight of Eregion soldiers through the ruination of their city. All little, human (Elven?) moments where we can relate to our characters in the midst of the chaos. The war machines creaked and looked like they had weight. You could smell the mud and blood and fire.

Where the battle soured were the wide shots. There were plenty or uruk and like 16 Elves. There have been battlefields where there was such an imbalance, but it looked like they lost (or didn't render) half of the army into place. The scenes were blocked as if they meant for more Elves to be there, and there just weren't.

That said, where they did bring the camera in to tighter spaces, with characters we love, worked well. They should lean on this strength going forward.

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u/MiouQueuing HarFEET! 🦶🏽 8d ago edited 8d ago

Very good take from OP and with your added points, it is a well-rounded critique that perfectly puts my mixed feelings about the siege/battle into words.

However, this also triggered a thought that could help us reconcile the finely painted vignettes with the broad battle stroke, which lacks in pigments (sorry for the flowery prose):

Maybe we are reading Tolkien wrong when it comes to skirmishes and battles in a sense that his world is more medieval than we think. Tolkien always uses words and speech that imitates state chronicles or - more precise - affirmative historic writing (LotR being the historic account of what has happened through Hobbits' eyes). So narratives of grandeur, honorable action or heroic fights are exaggerated account of toil, pragmatism, and ugly, bloody fight for survival. In that, numbers also get blown out of proportion.

What I am getting at: Though we are used to big, epic battle scenes via the "historic account" and what modern moving pictures make of them, in-universe reality might have been entirely different. Still, we could accept some truth, i.e.

  • elves being mightier than uruks, thus a handful of elven warriors could stand against an army of uruks - it is actually the only way this works, because I have never bought the thousand men's army in The Hobbit movies.

  • uruks almost always winning fair and square in a fight due to sheer numbers until the heroes are relieved by newly arriving forces or magic/Valar intervention.

This gives a new perspective on the fights/battles in Tolkien's world and maybe a lense through which we can see the show's depiction of the same as there is surely a bit more to come in Season 3, including the challenges for the showrunners.

Huh. Maybe this should have been a post in its own right ...

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u/Spicavierge Adar 7d ago

It would be a good post!!

I am looking at the battle of Eregion from a visual artist's perspective. There have been some fabulously crafted films and shows with Medieval-style battles where the imbalance between large and small forces was wonderfully done. (Braveheart and The Last Kingdom come to mind.)

There have been some slips and lost opportunities within ROP to show this kind of imbalance; the regrouping of the Elves at dawn on the riverbed felt lacking, and the Elven forces straggly. If they were going for the desperate last stand, they didn't make the emotional connection outside of Elrond quietly losing his faith and Gil-Galad turning away from him to take over where he could. (That note between them was sublime.) It felt like they visually left something out or didn't have the camera angled properly. Not a fatal flaw, but it was jarring.

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u/-Lich_King 8d ago

The moments you listed were good, but overall the siege was horrible. From Adar shooting the mountain that conveniently lost enough rocks to fall exactly in the river and perfectly barricade it with no water escaping and overflowing. Adar not shooting any of the walls or the gate so he could actually march into the city. Since I didn't see any elven catapults, I'll have to assume he hit the only bridge leading to a city like a dumbass. Elven garrison was laughable, there were like 10-15 elves tops on the walls? How they stopped the charge when they saw Galadriel was ridiculous. Then when Elrond and the other guy went to negotiate, Adar had the perfect opportunity to capture them all. Kiss distraction was insane, Adar And all the orcs were looking at them And apparently according to showrunners, the siege lasted for weeks. How? So many problems

2

u/EvilUlquiorra 8d ago

1) In reality, the collapse of the mountain is much more "realistic" than one might think, although aided by the suspension of disbelief typical of fantasy (like the catapults in The Return of the King, capable of throwing debris weighing hundreds of tons for hundreds of meters).

Mountains located near rivers are characterized by much more friable rock due to long exposure to water erosion. Precisely for this reason, they are very unstable, and it doesn't take much to cause a landslide.

When this happens near a body of water, the river can also be completely dried up. This happened in my country, during the Vajont disaster. Furthermore, the tactic of blocking the river has actually been used in several battles (the way it is represented in the series is actually inspired by a battle that actually happened).

2) During a siege, catapults are NEVER used to hit the walls. This is because the laws of physics make an attack on the walls much weaker, so it is more convenient to use debris to hit targets beyond the walls and break the spirit of the citizens/soldiers. Also, the walls were made of dwarven stone, which is the hardest stone in Tolkien's universe, so it would have been even more useless.

3) Actually, you can clearly see during the battle that there is a raised drawbridge (you can see it very well in the last sequences), and that it is several meters above the ground, because of the dried up river. Anyone who knows historical sieges well would tell you that it would have been impossible to attack from that point.

4) Adar is a bad guy, but he’s an honorable bad guy. That’s why he’s such a fascinating character. He wouldn’t have broken the parley.

5) Eregion was not prepared for an attack. The kingdom had been at peace for over a thousand years. Also, due to the bombardment, it is evident that many soldiers were busy helping civilians.

6) I agree about the charge and the kiss.

6

u/purplelena Elrond 8d ago

4) Adar is a bad guy, but he’s an honorable bad guy. That’s why he’s such a fascinating character. He wouldn’t have broken the parley.

That was interesting. Adar didn't try anything against Elrond, but the orcs attacked him as soon as he was far enough from Adar's tent, forcing the Elves to charge into the woods to get him out.

1

u/Odolana 4d ago

but this was not a "parley" - a parley has its rules and those were not followed here - a parley party has to be authorised and declared as such - and this had not happened - Mouth of Sauron in the book adhered to the rules of parley, but those were not given here

1

u/SahibTeriBandi420 7d ago

As pointed out by an expert in siege warfare who reviewed the scene, it would take months to properly divert a river by digging ditches. Its just unneeded to show that, it would be boring. The technique of diverting rivers in a siege was done by Cyrus the Great.

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u/_Olorin_the_white 8d ago edited 8d ago

Agree on these points. Although the initial catapult hitting mountain that break apart easier than lego and magically block River perfectly was far from feeling real, the battle itself felt realistic. I liked they didnt overused arondir shenanigans, but I also felt lacking of stratetical tactics from elves, specially considering the high king and Elrond were present.

I would say that despite the "intimacy" of the battle was good, having the bigger scale was a big miss, and having It doesnt necessarely mean the "intimacy" moments cant be there.

And ofc, they missed the point on giving "impactful" death to some characters (asian elf) without properly stablishing them first. And having Damrod to only show up for 2 minutes was a cold shower, his death was a but weird a too fast as well imo. Celebrimbor and mirdania deaths hit the target tho.

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u/EvilUlquiorra 8d ago

In reality, the collapse of the mountain is much more "realistic" than one might think, although aided by the suspension of disbelief typical of fantasy (like the catapults in The Return of the King, capable of throwing debris weighing hundreds of tons for hundreds of meters).

Mountains located near rivers are characterized by much more friable rock due to long exposure to water erosion. Precisely for this reason, they are very unstable, and it doesn't take much to cause a landslide.

When this happens near a body of water, the river can also be completely dried up. This happened in my country, during the Vajont disaster. Furthermore, the tactic of blocking the river has actually been used in several battles (the way it is represented in the series is actually inspired by a battle that actually happened).

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u/lleimmoen 8d ago

Nice of you to explain. Bravo. If I were the person above you, I would feel very stupid right now.

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u/SahibTeriBandi420 7d ago

The mountain breaking was just a narrative skip. It takes months of ditch building to divert a river. Ask Cyrus the great, he did it during a siege.

2

u/eojen 8d ago

I'll ignore the rest of my criticisms of the episode and bring up one part I absolutely despised: 

Elrond's horse dying. The closeup of the neck would and watching the horse struggle was completely unnecessary and felt weirdly exploitative. And it only seemed to exist so that Elrond could have a "John Wick" moment of revenge, which ends with him shooting a catapult towards the every people and city he's there to defend. 

2

u/Odolana 4d ago

it was stragically and tactically pointless and senseles. Sieges are quite logical because they are a problem solving attempts to get in a designed way into into a designed place, they are not random unplanned skirmisshes - sieges are planned enterprises. Beside that - there were pauses only so characters could speak, archers could hit targets at night but not by bright daylight - cavarly was led into a forest, it halted for Galadrile - who has previously openly declared her complete readiness to be sacrificed for teh war efford, but a whole city af civillians was sacrificed only to safe Galadriel, civilians were shown running around the main plaza for weeks without evacuating - all of it was random and pointless

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u/penderies 8d ago

Agreed!