Episode Five of The Rings of Power continues . . .
SWITCH
Kemen speaks to the Chancellor and tries to convince him that the people would follow his lead. The war is a return to the old, elf-friendly ways. Kemen wants to stop it.
The Chancellor, playing the long game, schools him on waiting.
The Queen meets with her father in the tower. Thinking he’ll be pleased, she tells him she’s traveling to Middle-Earth. He prophesies “darkness” for her.
FIVE
Nori reports to The Stranger that everyone’s happy about what he did with the wargs. His hand in a puddle, he whispers weird words, freezing the water around his fingers. The ice travels up his forearm. Worried, Nori tries to interrupt by grabbing him but her hand becomes trapped. In some kind of trance, he doesn’t notice as the ice branches onto her arm. His voice increases in intensity, the corona of Starfall flashes, and Nori is tossed free. When The Stranger checks on her, she dashes away. Threatening music intensifies.
(This is a turning point in their relationship. He scared Nori.)
Elrond proposes a toast at the elf king’s table. Durin lifts his glass. He and Gil-galad test each other with mild taunts. When Elrond tries to diplomatically intervene, Durin asks the king about the huge stone slab they use as the table. For dwarfs, a piece of stone this large is so precious, it would be only used for tombs or monuments. Gil-galad offers to send it home with him so it may be treated properly.
After the guests are gone and serving women have cleared the dishes, Gil-galad interrogates Elrond, demanding he recount an apocryphal legend. As Elrond begins, we see the tale as a gorgeous diorama:
A tree said to hide the lost Silmarils is the scene of a battle in the Misty Mountains. On one side, an elven warrior pours all his light into the tree. On the other, a Balrog (using Jackson’s creature design) pours its hatred. Lightning strikes the tree, forging their two powers. It seeps down the roots and into the mountain depths where it sleeps, creating an ore that contains the determination of evil, the purity of good, and the power of the lost Silmaril.
Elrond resists confirming the existence of this ore, mithril. Gil-galad shows him an elven tree that now withers. The Light of the Eldar is fading. When it is gone, all the peoples of Middle-Earth will perish to the darkness. Under this pressure, Elrond still holds firm to his oath to keep Durin’s secret, although he’s obviously torn.
Númenóreans sing and drink in the streets on the night before they set sail. Isildur pouts in the corner. He apologizes to Valandil, hoping he’ll help him onto the ship, but the newly made lieutenant refuses him.
Cut to someone sneaking onto a ship, but it’s Kemen. He’s ready to burn it when he hears a muffled cough. The stowaway is Isildur. They fight, and the lantern crashes into the spilled oil. As they run to escape, Kemen is knocked out by a beam. Isildur turns . . . and a long camera angle shows the ship exploding.
Elendil and other men dash to the dock while the ship continues to burst. Isildur tows Kemen to safety. Pulling them from the water, Elendil asks what happened. Both men lie to cover for each other.
From a high window looking down on the burning galley, the Chancellor reports to Galadriel and the Queen that they suspect a brigand. He recommends they delay the voyage, and Galadriel argues against him. Three ships remain. The Queen will make her decision in the morning.
Elrond learns from Celebrimbor that he knew the elf king’s plan all along. He’s tested the mithril and its light will save the elves. (It’s hard to understand all the intricacies of this plan because our brains are processing how sad Elrond is that his people want him to betray his friend, Durin.) As Elrond agonizes, Celebrimbor uses a memory of his father to persuade Elrond his oath-breaking is necessary.
Galadriel finds Halbrand at the forge and asks for his help. He admits that, before the raft, he fought alongside the orcs, not against them. We see a flashback of him and the townspeople bowing before Adar. When Galadriel speaks of darkness, he turns on her. Whose dagger does she carry, and how did her brother die? He demands: Why do you keep fighting? Her answer: She cannot stop. Her company mutinied and her friend conspired because she too closely resembled the evil she fought. She returns his pouch and insists that the only peace for either of them lies across the sea.
Cut to Adar, only now it’s Waldreg ready to bow before him. He pledges loyalty to Sauron, assuming Adar is he. Furious, Adar smacks and chokes him. He demands that Waldreg kill Rowan. People scream, and the scene ends as Waldreg approaches.
Arondir teaches Theo to use his bow. Feeling it’s pointless, Theo challenges Arondir. Half the people left the tower, why does he stay? His response is kind enough that Theo decides to show him the hilt. Recognizing the symbol, Arondir pulls brush away from an old statue that looks like a sacrificial altar, the hilt and its sword stabbing a bas-relief person.
He brings the hilt to Bronwyn and calls it a key to enslavement. From the top of the wall they can see the orc lights in the distance below. In despair, Bronwyn suggests they submit. He tries to convince her otherwise, but she sees no choice.
SIX
In the darkness, Adar looks up at the tower rising above the waterfall. The orcs, whose torch lights stretch for miles in the valley below, march.
SEVEN
Elves carry the stone table top on a procession through the forest. When one of them bobbles his hold, Durin chuckles. Elrond realizes Durin made up the whole table outrage. As they stand alone together, Elrond admits the truth about the elves’ desire for mithril. (It’s a clunky scene saved by two very good actors in a beautiful location.) Durin agrees to help.
Still at the forge, Halbrand stares at his kingly marker when he’s summoned to the Queen. He slams the pouch on a smithing table. A beat later he snatches it back and goes.
EIGHT
(There is no Eight.)
NINE
With pageantry, the Númenórean military processes through the city. Eärien sees Isildur among the ranks. Three ships wait in the sparkling bay. When Isildur boards, his friends scorn his presence, but they laugh when Elendil hands Isildur a shovel and sends him to tend the cavalry horses.
In slowmo with a traveling camera, Galadriel boards. She’s in full plate (no helmet, hair loose). The Sea Cadets stare with admiration as she crosses to shake Halbrand’s hand. Sails fill, and the galleys are away.
Roll credits.
CRITICAL NOTES
At Gil-galad’s dinner with Durin I finally noticed that Galadriel is the only woman elf with a speaking part in the series so far. All the others are men. A few women in jeweled veils sit at the table as ornamentation, and the servants are all women. I see no story or lore reason for this. You already know how troubled I am by Galadriel’s muddy character arc. I’m sad that she’s all we get as an example of womanly elfhood.
This disappointment is mild compared with my despair over the structure of this episode, though. I don’t know what the showrunners intended for a climax! That’s an almost impossible beat to miss.
The Two, the introduction of the Fateful Witches, is so prominent. I fully expected to see them again at the Eight, yet they never return. Setting sail for Middle-Earth, no matter how pretty, is no Eight. It’s Nine stuff, showing us where the story is headed.
Boarding the galleys, Galadriel taking her place in glory, is a beat with a purpose in the season-wide story. It’s probably the season’s Switch, actually. It’s an important moment, just not in this particular episode. The Eight needs to fulfill the Trouble presented at the Two. It needs to be the culmination of the problems presented in the Four and Five. This episode doesn’t revolve around Galadriel; her triumph is not its climax.
I’m trying to wrap my brain around the disaster here.
The first part of this episode was so decisive. The Stranger looking at the stars at the One leads into the witches looking at his Starfall impact zone at the Two leads into Adar trying to avoid the biggest star of all, the sun, at the Three. Of all those characters, the only to make an appearance here at the end is Adar.
Adar’s face doesn’t make a great Three/Six mirror, but it happens in the right spots. I’ll count it.
Decisions happen in the Seven slot, so I’ll count that, too. Durin agrees to save the elves by allowing them access to mithril. Halbrand agrees to accept his kingly role and travel to help his people. The conflict surrounding those decisions are wrangled with earlier in the episode, so these are acceptable. None of those beats, except Halbrand’s presence on the ship, has any relevance to what happens at the end of the episode, though.
I have never in all my years of looking at Story Enneagram breakdowns found a plot with no Eight. Holy cow.