Hi there, I'm Stephanie.

And I'm Lydia. Come along with us as we explore and learn about the world of Tolkien through deep dives on lore, characters, read-a-longs, and laugh-a-longs.

We are excited to have you as a new friend on this journey with us. Welcome to Speak Friend and Enter, a Lord of the Rings podcast.

Alright, welcome to Speak Friend and Enter. We have a really exciting topic today. We are talking about the big bad evil man himself. That's right, Sauron's boss. I think his name is Morgoth. Melkor slash Morgoth.

There you go. So he's got two names, typical shifty character. I have never heard of him. Like, prior to this, I had maybe, maybe seen the name mentioned, but I didn't really understand the relationship.

Didn't know he was a Valar. Like, I'm very intrigued by this guy. He has his finger in every pie. He's out to ruin everybody's lives. Like, he's kind of the kind of villain I could root for. So I'm like worried I'm going to start to like him. This is the thing.

I think this is the episode you have been most excited about. I think so. Because every time I like start talking about, I don't know, like the creation or everything else, you're like, tell me more about Mordor.

What was Mordor doing? How did people respond to him?

Like, what is going on there? Yeah, it could be any topic. And it's like, so they were baking pies, but what was Melkor's pie?

What was his opinion on the bake off? I just need to know more. And I will say I like normally in any kind of book or story, I am. It's not like I love villains, but I think they're fun. Like, especially when they're really villainous.

Yes. When there's like no backstory to them, where it's like, oh, and they had a horrible childhood. And that's why they turned out this way. We don't have to be that way. Sometimes people are just horribly selfish.

Yeah. And that's, you know, I respect them for that. Let's go. You're like, okay, there's something to do. Okay. I think this might be one of the most interesting episodes because I, as I was researching Melkor Morgoth, first of all, I felt very intimidated because his life is basically the history of Middle Earth. Right. Like his, his desires.

He's there from the beginning. He's there to be in. He constantly have, we talked about in the creation episode, his discord song is literally woven into the material creation of Arda. And so I was telling Lydia a little bit earlier, I was like, I kind of feel like Melkor is the main character of Tolkien's universe.

It's a fighting words, but I almost wonder, like, so much is centered around this character's search for power of creation and how he wants to dominate it.

What's really cool. And I don't know if we've talked about this yet is the fact that Tolkien said to himself, my bid bad, he's just, you know, when you watch a Bond movie and the villain's whole plan is to destroy the world. And I'm like, the world that you live on, you don't have a spaceship. You don't have you're destroying the world.

You just started the world. Yeah. And like, it just never made sense. And sometimes in fantasy, you have these villains where it's like, and they want to destroy the world, but I'm just like, why, why, why, why?

What is the source? So I love that Tolkien, when he has his bid bad, his villain, it's, it's more about the warping of the creation power. It's not about destruction. It's sort of like destruction, but it's really not. These are different things. And so it's more about the fact that this creative urge has been corrupted. And that, that just feels like there's so many similarities to that in our world.

Whereas you're just not going to meet. Relatable. Yes, very relatable. I'm like, you're just not going to meet in your day to day life. The guy who's out to destroy the world. Yes.

I know. Okay. So I am really excited for this episode. I, like I said, I did some research and there's so much here. So I'm going to try to go on like lightly over just the story. This is the overview, right? His overview of kind of the main points of his journey, where he is during middle, like the Lord of the Rings

later when we deep dive into him. I'm very curious if Tolkien wrote any commentary on how he viewed him. Like does Tolkien do it?

I'm genuinely curious. You him as a protagonist in any sense. So later. Okay. Yeah, we can discuss this later. Okay. But welcome to the war. Morgoth, the first dark Lord, the so called strongest Valor before he was banished from the group. And I found this bomb quote and it's from the children of Huron. And this is Morgoth speaking. He says, I am the elder King, right? Technically, I think Manway is the position, but he says, I am the elder King.

Melkor, first and mightiest of the Valor who was before the world and made it. The shadow of my purpose lies upon Arda and it and and all that is in it, been slowly and surely to my will. So I think this is kind of like his. This is him saying, this is who I am. Yeah.

And this is my ability of how he feels like. I'm not in a rush. We can take over the world tomorrow, but he literally says slowly and surely.

But that's so funny. It's like the tortoise in the hair.

So is he in fact, he's not virtues. He's not virtues. Is he in fact the oldest?

So he acts like he is. He acts like he is. I think he if he is

not the oldest, he's one of the oldest. I thought Manway and him were like the same age. Okay. But I could be wrong. Maybe he is the OG.

And I mean, I'm just because he's here is Lucifer, the oldest. I don't remember. Lucifer and Christ are like Christ was Christ was no no Christ is the firstborn. And then he's got to be the second. I think so. So it's like always this battle between the child. Yeah, maybe watch out, middle children everywhere. But it's so I mean, I particularly enjoy mythology and my theology where it's all about like the strife between siblings, because that that moment is relatable.

Anybody who has siblings, raise your hand. Like you have had strife. And then just to see it blown up to these epic proportions. It's why I like the core of it is so relatable, though, that so everyone can understand. And and and you yeah, I love it.

Yeah. So it's definitely interesting that he takes some pride in being like I was the first in the rightiest, right? Like I have some backstory and that's where we're going to start with some of his backstory here. So he starts off with it sounds like his given name is Melkor. And it is interesting because he says I was the first in the mightiest and his name and Quinnia is he who arises in might. So from the beginning, like his name from Eru was like he who arises in might. Like he was like, this is a strong dude. And then we're going to talk about his name change a little bit later on.

So he starts with the name Melkor and moves into Mordor. Yeah.

Yeah. He starts with the name. There's got to be an etymology reason for that, but also I'm genuinely curious. We should dig into some of his names and look into this.

So but also just in general, I love and we've got to talk about names in the future. Yeah. But I love the concept of the name change. We defining the person. You see this a lot in the Bible. You see it all over the place.

And he just like natural people. His name, I believe. Yeah. I don't think this is given from someone else. I think he reframed himself. But interesting. He is so incendarin. His morgoth name is black foe of the world. So you can immediately see he's like, I am picking violence.

Yes. I am picking enmity. And I.

And it's fascinating that he's so. I don't know. From the beginning, the antagonism, right? That antagonism is coming out. Okay. So we're going to start off. With the beginning, right? In the creation, we talked about this. He is part of the song that creates the world. Yeru Aluvatar, the creator of Tolkien's world, starts singing this beautiful song to create the earth or Arda. And he has this legion of angels called the Ainur.

Melkor is there as one of them. And he starts singing with his angels. And most of the angels are singing along with him. Melkor starts singing a dissonant tune, something that doesn't quite go along. He's trying to almost create his own version of the world. He's going against Yeru's creation song. And a few people join in with him. A few people don't. But there's a little bit of contention here in this song.

What's funny to me is like you're singing. Yeah, this is not subtle.

Like, you know, you can hear this. You can hear this. Yeah, this isn't like Backroom Politician or, you know, I've negotiated with these three other Ainur that like tonight we're going to stab, you know, and secret.

Yeah, it's like tonight we're going to try to stab him tonight, you know. It's not secret. This is a big step of like it seems like from the beginning, he was like, I'm not signed on for this. I'm ready to punch out on my own, which is interesting because I'm sure he's actually very wily and I think of Sauron as being very wily. Yeah. So it's interesting that he's also so confrontational.

Yeah, he's like, I'm going to start singing my own tune and it's directly against Eru's, right? And so like I said, some people join him, some people don't. And Eru has a couple of different phrases of this song where he like stops the song, restarts it, stops the song, restarts it and consistently Melchor's there and his song is sometimes really strong. But at the very end, Eru's song encompasses his, right? He takes it in and is somehow able to get rid of the dissonance and add it into this overall tune that is unified.

Works and is unified. Which is amazing. And it's a beautiful message of like, look, the themes in the world that are trying to warp what is good. Yeah. Actually, they can just be rewoven. Rewoven. Cause you think of the warped theme as entirely broken, but no, it's just off track. We can just pull it back in.

Well, that's interesting. Yeah. And so at the end of this song, we realized Eru does come back and he says, Hey, Melchor, by the way, like you have a strong voice, right? Like you are singing. You're so out of tune.

Yeah, you are so out of tune. Imagine being that quiet director.

I think it was so interesting that he said, but ultimately, like I want you to know, like I am your creator and anything that you create, even if it's in dissonance, is ultimately going to end up fulfilling the purpose of this creation.

Right. And so I'm sure Melkor was a little like, miffed with that.

Or he was salty. No, like what I do is going to be my own independent thing. But he was saying it's all part of one thing. Right. No matter what you do, it's going to be part of this bigger story and this bigger creation. Something else I learned about him in this pre-existence, which I thought was interesting is he actually was searching for the source of the light of creation. The spark of life. The spark of life as we've been calling it. Malcolm

was looking for it in order to try to find it. He wanted it for his own. Of course. But he didn't realize that Eru was the source of this. Right. And that there is no way that he could take this from Eru.

And so I wonder if his boldness in this song was like, I cannot, I cannot create independently on my own with this, this spark of life, but maybe I can morph. Yeah. Yeah. And maybe I can. Yeah.

And I bet that is right. I guess he would have been so frustrated. He's like, he's been searching for like, what did they used to call the well of youth or the fountain of youth?

He's been searching for this fountain of youth. He can't find it. He finally realizes that he can't have it.

And he's like, what is the second best? What is the second best thing that maybe I could use this power for my own? OK, so that makes sense because it basically it wasn't like there were the heavens and then there were the iron or and then immediately they started seeing this. There's a prologue here. Yeah.

There's a prologue frustration and like, of like, I want to be able to create. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. OK, which is very interesting.

So yes. So that's kind of the preamble, the preamble to Melkor. And then as we discussed in our previous episode, he is part of this group called the Valar.

I think there's 14 to begin with. He's included that come down to the earth and they are responsible for kind of preparing the earth for the beings that are going to be coming.

Yes, that you are going to create. They're responsible for the skies, the lighting, the the plants, the some of the animals.

So all of that extra piece. But this is where Melkor, I feel like really starts showing his metal. So he comes down. He's he's fascinated by Arda. Right. He's fascinated that it's this new place. And how can you not be new? Yeah. New opportunity. Right.

He's like a shark. He's like, oh, hello. There's blood in this water. Yes, and Eru is not here.

Eru is not directly here. Like this is a free space. And so he comes down with the other Valar and he tries to convince them to make him the leader of their group at first. And so he's like, you know, I'm the oldest. I'm the most powerful, but they don't. They actually decide that Manway is going to be.

Do you know if that was like a hard fought battle? I don't know. Long decision. Was it just kind of like glossed over a little bit?

I'm not sure. I'm not sure how intense. I doubt they came to fist over this.

But maybe this is just early signs. I think this is like for me.

Concussion. Yeah, early contention. Yes. And it said that the people that the other Valar decided to go with Manway because they felt like he understood the thought of Eru better than any of his peers, which we see later on in the story. Manway seems to keep a very close relationship with Eru. But Malcolm is feeling a little better about this. I mean, lost election. It's probably a little tough.

And so this, I mean, he's a

big, he's an evil dude, but also this kind of reminds me of a toddler. So the Valar started going around their work, right? They're trying to create and Melcore is just there disrupting their efforts.

I'm not exactly sure, you know, what all the

details are of what he was doing. Like if someone did a plan, if he undid it and

there's no chance that anyone was able to set a single pile of wooden blocks

without him coming through and not going to tell them where they're not even able to create a light source. That's because they hadn't started that process yet.

They hadn't finished it. Right. Yeah. And so or maybe they started it, but they weren't able to finish it. They are struggling to the point where it says that Arda was essentially kept shapeless because of everything that Melcore was like virtually ruining. He is competent.

He's competent. And it gives credence to his statement that he was the mightiest. Yeah. Right.

I will say, though, that destruction is easier than creation. It is. So if other people are creating and he's just out there like messing with it and making it not work. Yeah. So it is. So it's just like when you think about the numbers, it's oh, it's 13 to one. Right. So it's 13. Good. One bad.

That's a fun way of looking at it because you always seem to 13 as like an evil set. Yeah. All right. So anyways, but there's 13 people trying to get stuff done. Yes. And then there's Melcore and he's like, yeah, that's what he probably stayed busy messing up everyone's things.

You have an interesting point where I'm like this when I'm just like going over some of the general things and kind of getting an idea of this, I was just getting the impression he's like disrupting things. Yeah. But is he actually trying to bend any of the Valor's creations to him?

I wonder. Or is he at this point, he's just like, I'm miffed. I'm going to maybe the initial stage is like a fit of spite. He's like, and we're not creating that. Yeah. He does zaps at all. And then or maybe he is trying to bend it and hasn't figured out how to do it yet.

And so that's why things are being destroyed. Practice. That would be fun to look into. I'm curious. OK. So but eventually this is where we get one of our Valor that comes to eventually replace him because he is banished. The Valor like we're trying to get rid of you now. Like you are so messing up our plans.

Is there any like big reveal moment? Does Melcore like do they come? What's the word for like when you come home, you open the door and everyone's sitting in your living room? Yeah, and you're like, this is an intervention. There it is. Yes. The intervention. So what was the intervention like? Do we know? I have no idea.

Are you going to have to dig into that further? Very exciting. I think that's going to be very funny. An intervention idea. And so at some point they're

like, OK, he goes home and he finds Tulkis was like sitting in his living room.

Exactly. And so this was the point where they're like, we need help. And I'm generally curious how this communication happened to you. I'm not entirely sure. Yeah. But the ball at Tulkis, who we talked about in our previous episode, he's the wrestler, the laffer, the warrior, they call him champion of the baller. He comes down and it's with his strength that the balance is in favor of the baller. And so Melcore flees.

OK, so he does. He flees. He's not caught. He's not banned.

He's not caught at this point in time. He's banished in a sense, but he kind of like leaves the battlefield. Yeah. So he's kind of banished from the baller because Tulkis comes down and they're like, OK, we're done with you. And Melcore flees and he leaves Arda for a time. Where does he go?

I don't know. I'm like, what do you mean he leaves Arda? Like, where is he going? Is he just going to the void? Is he going back to a real avatar? Probably not. I doubt it. My guess is he's just hanging out in the voids of the world. OK. But always watching.

Yeah, always watching. Which gives a creepy vibe.

Creepy vibe. But also I'm like, maybe this is when he goes from destruction, right? Where he was saying like.

Maybe he is watching. He's learning how the creation process works and he sees right there. Yeah. If I insert my little gene splicer right there. Yeah.

That's interesting. Maybe is this the point in his life where he's like, OK. I'm frustrated because I can't create the version of the world that I want. So I'm just going to tear down whatever you try to create. But then he has this moment of intersection.

I'm assuming like inspection where he's like, man, I can't directly, you know, maybe destroy things. But what can I do? What can I do on my own? What do I want?

What is like my end goal ultimate point? And I wonder if this is a reflection time for him. OK, so he departs and that's where the Valar are actually able to get some things done. So they're like finally. Finally, they make the two great lamps in Middle Earth. They set a dwelling place. They're able to kind of finish all the details of the skies and the plants and everything else. So every beautiful thing.

Every beautiful thing. And then has Melkor's had like Melkor's taste always been like really bad. Do you know what I mean? Like when he was warping stuff, was it a matter of I'm going to turn this beautiful creature into the hideous orc equivalent? Or was it just the even just the fact that he was changing it to suit himself? OK, was that the sin?

This is my because later on we know. Like I feel like I feel like the orcs are a spite move. He's like elves, the most beautiful creature. I will create the ugliest thing. Yeah, you know. OK, I wonder what the range of his.

Where that comes from. OK, this is my thought process here because so when he is part of the creation song, yeah, right with Eiru, they call it dissonance, right? So it's something that when you think of dissonance, doesn't sound great.

So it goes along with your dissonance doesn't even necessarily mean that it's too far off.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And so that's what you're talking about. It's kind of like there's a little something that doesn't. It's not great, right? You're taking elves, you're making orcs. You're having a dissonance song.

That's that's a dissonance. Yes, but this is my thought process because we talked about Aule, right? The Valar or the Valar, who is somewhat similar and he loves to create and he creates the shapes of the dwarves. And so I think about the idea that a lot of the I know or this host were following along with Eiru's song, but that I wonder if they were like soloist parts. And I wonder if there were like trills and ways that people were going off and creating their own bit of music along with his tune.

For sure. Because we all know that. That's how harmony works. Yeah, that Eiru comes down and he sees Aule has created something and he doesn't say. And he respects it. Yeah, he doesn't say, no, that's not my song. Yeah. Like back off. Yeah.

He says, oh, this is pretty cool. This is in harmony with what I've created. I had a plan, right? He said, I had a plan to do this, but I'm going to envelope your plan into my plan. So then that kind of leans towards a conclusion of Meltor's taste was always so bad because anything he wants to create is somehow in disharmony with what Eiru's

I think what it is is he wanted to create for his own pride and spite. Maybe and that automatically infected. Yeah.

And I wonder if like, because like the outside is not always necessarily the inside, right? Sauron is like a beautiful looking man, right?

And a lot of the presentations to the elves and in certain stories.

Yeah, he is like a lord of like the facade. Yeah, exactly. Like there's the facade of beauty. And I wonder if Meltor could have created something that looked beautiful, that looked like something Eiru would have made, but was just evil on the inside.

Yeah, because we see like all of his creations. And this is why sometimes, like, you know, sometimes what greens feels a little bit black and white because it's like, yeah. And here we have our elves and here we have our orcs. I wonder which side is, you know, we thought about that.

Yeah, we're just like, I should join. But at the same time, like, I don't know. Like it just makes me wonder if he decided screw the facade. We're dropping the facade. Yeah, later on.

Well, because he has moments where he tries to play the game. Yeah. OK. So I agree. I'm curious why this discord, I think it just arises from his intentions. Yeah. I think because his intentions.

So it doesn't matter that he's trying to create something beautiful, but because his intentions are. I think it warps it.

Yep. I think anything he tries to create is warped because of his negative.

This feels almost like a Midas's curse.

Yeah, Midas touch. Like anything he touches has this.

Yeah. And like, obviously it's his fault, but at the same time.

Why also? One could pity him. One could pity him because you're like, OK, you want to create, but it's not that he wants to create because there's other beings who want to create you and they're fine.

It's the and they're fine. It's that he wants to create with the idea of domination and power and possessing and controlling. Yeah. And. Yeah, that's an interesting game. Interesting. It's fascinating. OK, so this is the time period. They call it the spring of Arda where they're finally able to have like life.

We banished Melkor and he took winter with him.

Winter with him. We have the lamp. We have some some. N animals. We have some plants like life is good. But then. Dun dun dun.

Someone doesn't stay away for long. Oh, so Melkor.

We and where would we be without him? Where would we have drama? This is why I feel like Melkor slash Morgoth is kind of like the main theme, the main character of this. And we can go into the stories at the end, but Tolkien doesn't really write necessarily an end for Middle Earth and like what his ending is. But I wonder if he would ever considered some kind of, I don't know, redemption or thought process when it comes to him, because he is the story.

I feel like it's a really fun question. I want to talk about it when we know more because the when you consider the Ark for Golem, yeah, there is redemption, Ark. There is a redemption, Ark. We have the Smeagol Ark. We have everything. And then at the very end, yeah, Golems like greed wins out.

But it's fascinating. But it's in purpose for the higher power. It's all for the higher power. It's so thematic.

It's ridiculous. And I did not know, like now that I know more about the creation story and weaving in the like malcontent, yeah, that makes the Golem story even more powerful and perfectly thematic. Fascinating. Yeah, I love that. Oh man. For the higher story.

Yeah. So, OK, he comes back and I'm actually not exactly sure how this happens, but he doesn't come back alone. Oh, he comes back. He's out recruiting. He's out recruiting.

And so, a boy to discuss. I think it may be one of our next episodes, the Myer spirits. OK, yeah, yeah, yeah. And so in this host of I know we know this like this host of angels. We have the Valar who are kind of like this 14. They're pretty powerful. We like the 14 commanders, right? Yes.

Yeah. And then the Myer spirits, they're technically also part of this I know, but it sounds like their life and their powers are not to the same. They're just less powerful. And degree. They're less powerful. Even though they are also these kind of pre creations, which is an interesting statement. So when Melkor comes back and he has recruited, has he only recruited Myer?

He's recruited various Myer, but no other Valar.

No other Valar. That's interesting. He is unpopular amongst his peers.

He's unpopular amongst his or unable to persuade them. I guess. Yeah. I mean, we'll persuade, which is interesting because these are, it says like Myer spirits who had attuned themselves to his music. So these are some of the spirits that maybe like in the creation song, we're like, yeah, oh, I like this. I'm swayed by your power. I wonder if these are the ones that were like, yeah, he's the mightiest. Right. Like he's the oldest and the mightiest. I would go with him.

So I have something to say about that. So growing up, did a lot of piano. And when you do competitions or any kind of like theme, you usually play from each of the four periods, right? So you've got classical, you've got. Romantic, Baroque. So Baroque, classical, romantic and modern.

You're supposed to like play us on from each of these in like some of these competitions, right? Anyways, so attuning them to his music, I feel that so deeply because I hate modern, modern music. I hate it so much. However, when I was assigned to do one of those modern pieces, you practice it enough that you grow to like it.

Yeah. And like initially when I play it, I'm like, oh, this is garbage. I'm going to hate this. And then four or five weeks later, it's like, this is so fine. And when that's the only thing you listen to, you start to think that this is music, right? But then you like go to a concert that has rock, Mononoff or Beethoven, you're like, oh, yeah, that trash modern stuff.

It's so funny. I feel that on such a deep level. So almost like a training. Yeah. Some kind of like training situation. It's that exactly. Yeah. And so that's what I think is so interesting is he doesn't come back alone. Yeah. Right. There's something that's happened.

And what's like, can you just stay with the other spirits? How does he bring like 100 people with him? More or less? I'm not sure.

It's just not many is various spirits. OK, it could have been a lot then. We will discuss. We're going to go into some of these, Myer and what they turn into and what they are.

I think there's a decent number. OK. Is not spoiler alert, but we're going to talk about Balrogs. We're going to talk about like creatures that became that were myer spirits that were twisted. Oh, that's cool.

I'm not going to become a specific set of creatures. That's really cool. So I think there's a decent number of people coming. Yeah. All right. OK, with that, we know that he so he kind of sneaks back in.

He's not shows up. Nobody notices. He sneaks back in to Arda, specifically Arda.

And he creates a fortress at the northern part of the world called a Tune Moe. Wait, how do you say it? A Tune Moe, U T U M N O. OK. A Tune Moe, a Tune Moe. And so he creates this fortress kind of sneaks back in and the Valar don't quite know that he's returned, but this is the thing. They start seeing decay, decay starts coming from the north. So he has figured something out.

He knows how to do it. They have they realize he must have he must be back. Right. So fascinating. I don't know why this decay. Like you were saying, like, why is his stuff? Yeah.

Ugly. Why is he like this?

Why is he the way he is? Is it a choice? Is this because of his bad intent?

Yeah. Where is this coming from? I mean, it's got to be for because of his opposition to Eru Aluvatar.

That's my thought process. Yeah. OK. Lovely. OK. So they start seeing decay and they think to themselves, do they instantly leap to the conclusion? Oh, yes, it's Meltor. Did they have to run through like a flight check? But did everyone set up the plants correctly? Have we been watering that?

I think you're probably. I think is this you? I told you to set up a process

because there's enough people where like in our world, if you had 14 people on a project and something bad started happened, there'd be a lot of blame fienders. I think I think they kind of know. They know.

I think with the evidence of what they're seeing, I think they're like, this can only be one thing. We know who this is.

We don't even have to scooby do. You know, the villain. But it's interesting because before they even like mobilize themselves to start searching and to start addressing this, Melkor strikes. Oh, Dan. So he's preemptive this time. He's very preemptive. And he comes and he destroys the light lamps, which are giving light to the earth. OK. And he cast them down and he scorches large portions of the world.

Interesting. And then he retreats. So he comes, he destroys the lamps, casting the world into darkness and retreats back to his fortress. I love in like our world mythologies, I love thinking about things like they'll say something like, and then the sun did this thing.

And then there was like fires and destruction. I'm like, is it an asteroid? Did an asteroid hit us? So I love like thinking what celestial body could have caused this phenomenon that literally every myth is speaking about. And that feels like a celestial body myth. It's like we had the sun and then they were cast down and there are large fires everywhere. It just feels like it like squirts.

There like a lot of their work was destroyed entirely.

OK. Not entirely, probably, but a lot. Like enough to matter. And like that was so that was his first real strike.

Big comeback.

And he did a good job of it. He retreated. And so this is what I think is interesting. And I would love to see more like as we dig in at similar alien, like what was going on here. But it sounds like after that, after the destruction of the lamps, the Valar were a little bit and like, oh, my gosh, what do we do?

A little bit of like a numb state of shock. Maybe because what they decide to do is they withdraw from this main continent. The geography of Middle Earth is very confusing. It changes throughout our way. And what's the word for when all the continents are together? Are we in a pangea state right now?

Still in a flat world. A flat world. Yeah. And then at a certain point, it goes round. Shut up. And then there's different continents that come. There's islands that sink. There's that's really cool stuff. So I'm not fully equipped to speak to that now, but we should go into another deep dive on geography.

I want to know about the flat world.

Yes, exactly. It was flat. And then it goes around. Was it also too deep? Maybe.

I don't know. I don't know. And so, OK, as a result, they decide to kind of gather their powers. Yeah.

And I mean, that would be an intimidating strike. Yeah, it was an intimidating strike. And it destroyed a lot. And so they decide to kind of congregate together and they build Valinor. And so Valinor is kind of this place in the West. We hear it's very protected. It's where the Valar are living. It's the safe harbor.

Is that a word for it? It kind of feels like this safe haven. Yeah, safe haven.

Yeah, like there's some kind of haven there. And it feels very much like it's interesting to me that they've been fighting him back and forth, fighting him back and forth. He comes, he destroys so much and their response is, oh, man, we're so mad.

We're going after him right away. Yeah, it's a hungry down. They're almost defensive. It's very defensive. It's very defensive where they kind of take their powers and they're like, OK, let's go smaller. Let's protect ourselves. They have offensive powers, right? Yeah, I would think so. But maybe they're so tired.

I mean, I mean, I've fought with him before. I am not sure. But this is the thing. They take a certain section of the world. They defend it.

They make it beautiful. They kind of come back in that area. But there's a large section that they leave behind. Leave it.

They leave behind. Is this more door? This is not entirely more.

It's bigger. It's almost all on Middle Earth, they say. So there's a continent that they kind of take over and they they bring their defense in here. They re beautify it. They defend it.

But then they leave a lot free reign. That's crazy. And so Melkor is like, hey, this is this word for me. Yeah. And so he starts moving in.

He builds another fortress and Angbad. And that's one that it's given to us. I've heard of this name. I've heard of this name. Yeah, Angbad. So this is one of the references to Sauron, one of the Maya, Maya spirits that's coming down. And at this point, Sauron is with him. Yes.

But I will also say I don't know when this takes place. But Sauron was also a spirit that we believe interacted with other Valar. Like he was training with Aula. He had interactions.

So when we're talking about Maya spirits coming back with Melkor, we're not just talking about spirits that have been in Eru's presence. Right. I think we're talking about spirits that maybe have an Eru's presence. Maybe they've been down on the earth. Yeah, down on the earth.

They came with the Valar. Yeah. And so that's what I think is really interesting. So that's funny, because when we said, oh, there was Melkor hanging out in the ether, just watching all creepily.

Actually, maybe no, maybe he was visiting in secret and talking to the Maya that were on Arda. He just went on a secret mission. Yeah, secret mission. So this is the era of his expansion, I would say. His dominion.

And so he's really expanding here while the Valar are unsure what to do or kind of like defensive. Also, so this goes into, I thought this was really interesting. This goes into the time period where the lamps have been destroyed. And so it's dark. Yeah. And so the Valar are trying to figure out what to do next. Right, because so much effort went into those lamps.

So much effort went into that. Yeah. And so they decide they're going to build trees, a new light source. And this one isn't like built, I think Ale helped with the first lamps. These ones, I think, is heavily on Yovanna. OK. And like some of the Valar with a little more of a green thumb.

I just love the concept. It's so cool.

And so we have a golden and a silver tree. It gets very sun and they have names. They do have names. I don't know where they are. Let me see if I can find the names of the trees.

Because in real time, there is a tree that's very important that has a name. And like a Vendisaur is the name of the tree. It's just like very it's a big myth. And it feels to me like the tree of life myth and like it dress seal and like all these other things that I love the concept of the the world tree. I guess. And this is the world tree, but there are two of them.

There are two of them. And there's a silver and gold and we have the silver tilperion and the gold Laura. Laurel and Laurel and OK, I like that.

I've not heard those names. So I haven't heard those names. And it says they shine for seven hours each with a one hour overlap of dawn and dusk. Really beautiful. So they they do a good job. They come back. They they do a light source, but they're in a smaller they're in a smaller environment. They're not the whole world this time.

And so but this is the thing. Melkor is expanding. They recreate this life, this light source. But is this all pre elves? So that's the thing. Elves are discovered, right?

They don't of course, of this during the course of all of this. Oh, wow. So I'll are discovered. But this is the thing. They're out in Middle Earth. They're not in Valoran or maybe the hunter was out riding around scouting. This is interesting.

Oh, they say here. Melkor discovered the elves before the Valor and was able to capture some of them. And this was the first. Oh, no. Time where we're seeing some iteration here that maybe turned into the orc.

So because the Valor, I feel like this was a big issue, that the Valor kind of messed up. They came together, they created a new life source, life source good for them.

But they didn't know that Eurylipitar had basically planted a seed and like out what's brown enough.

That the beings that they were anticipating coming to earth were going to be born in Middle Earth away from Valinor.

Okay, so when the hunter who's named I forgot. Oro. Thank you. When he was riding around that was in Valinor? That was in the Middle Earth.

So he was out wandering. He was out wandering. Okay, interesting. And he that's where he fell on the edge. He was out wandering. So it's interesting because I'm like, why were they so defensive? Obviously they were watching a little bit, right? Maybe they should have been watching more, what could I argue? But they're watching a little bit. And so once the elves are born, this is officially the beginning of the first age.

Right, so we have the trees. Yeah, we have the trees. We have the elves. So this is where I think things start getting super dramatic. And I'm not gonna go too much into all the story detail because there's so much cool stuff.

And I feel like this is essentially the Somal reliant. Right, this is what we're going to be digging into is all of this drama and all of the stories, but Melkor of course is at the center of it. And so, okay, so Oro goes out and he discovers the elves. Does he take them back with him? Well, he realizes that they're there, but this is the thing. Once he comes back and the Valar realize that the elves are here and they're like, these are the beings that we have been waiting for.

This is what we've been probably for. They go full out. Kudos to them. Oh, good for them.

They come out of Valar. So was release. And they go ham on attacking Morgoth. They go to his different. His fortresses. Fortresses, the Toonmo, and the other one, which I don't remember, all the top of my head. I'm bad, I think. And they rent open this doors and they like capture him.

So they're just trying to cut the head off the snake and they succeed, they capture him. They succeed.

They capture him. And so once they realize like, oh my gosh, there's beings here that we need to protect.

Yeah, and there's no room to like, that's interesting because they're like, when it's just us. Like maybe we huddle. Yeah, maybe we huddle. But that's a very strong protective instinct and I respect that.

Yeah, so they realize, oh my gosh, these are the beings we've been waiting for. And they go out and they take some pretty preactive, or not, I guess not pre. Not as preemptive.

But not as preemptive as could have been. Strong reaction, reaction.

Strong reaction, we'll go with that.

And so they overthrow him, but in their haste to kind of capture him and move on. Do they forget Sauron? They don't necessarily like investigate the Toonmo and the pits and the vaults and all of the Myer spirits that have been following him. And so there's a lot of creatures.

So they leave all those dreads hanging. Yes, that are there. Sauron included. Sauron's at large. There's Balrogs. There's these things he's been testing.

There's creatures and they get him and they bounce. So it sounds like there's not a full investigation into the breath of what was going on. Yeah, okay. So they capture him and I actually have to, I have to figure out, I didn't go into, if they were using the chain that we talked about.

Yeah, we don't know if they were using the chain yet. If they were using the official chain that Owlway created or if they were using something else, but they captured, I think they have a specific fortress that they keep him in. I'm not exactly sure where that is.

I could look that up. But they have him in containment for a decent amount of time. Does the decay stop or has he unleashed it? You know, like is it?

It does have a life of its own now. I think things went into hibernation.

So I would say they were still areas of decay. And now it's not spreading anymore. Yeah, they were areas of decay, but it's not growing. There's nothing antagonistic I think happening without him at this point. And so they capture him. It says a lot of time passes where he's just captured.

And I don't know exactly what else is going on during this time period, but it sounds like, he's out of sight, out of mind. They're like, good job, pat on the back. We did it, did you? We're not worrying about this anymore. We got L still attached.

Yeah, exactly. But then this is when things get interesting. Now, Cork comes back. He's brought before Manway and he says, I'm so sorry. So he's

brought out of confinement. He's brought out of confinement. But we also read somewhere, I think it was Niana, one of the other baller, that she was a spokesperson for him. So I don't know if that was before this, where she said, hey, there's something here or if she was just like an advocate for him. When he came forward, I'm not sure what that means.

But it sounds like he is like, please give me another chance. You've had me in confinement. I've learned my lesson. You slapped my wrist. Let me go. They really did just slap his wrist.

And so we talked about this before. We're like, Manway, he's like, I mean, who would want to be evil anyways, right? Like he's kind of this person who's like, I can't comprehend why you would want to pursue this, right? Like he's so in line, I guess.

And Varda, who just knows better.

Yeah, his wife Varda, evidently, in this whole situation was like, I doubt this. Yes, I doubt this. And there was some extra info here. But there's votes. There's votes. And they said, Tolkis and Ulmo also were some baller that were very slow to forget. Melchor is evil. But they let him back in. Right. And so it sounds like there was some contradictory opinions, but Manway, because it sounds like he is the leader. He ordered that he would be released.

Dane. So he's going to be regretting that forever. I know. And so at this point, Melchor, he's kind of playing along with it. He says, you know, he's he's filled with malice, but he's decided to use cunning to try

to see if there is a way. Which is really interesting, because I think of him and Sorana as being cunning first. But, you know, when he talks about I am the mightiest, like it just seems like brute action is really his go to first go to.

Yeah. And then when that fails, he's like, and now we must use our wiles. Exactly. And I think it's interesting because he's like, he he realizes that his undoing was the elves that the Valor cared so much.

So he hates the elves. Particularly hates them. And he's decided that he wants to use whatever he can to to hurt them. Right.

Like he's kind of this one. Maybe they already had tested iterations of the orc, but it's this one does the orc proper because he's like, the Valor love these elves.

I'm going to make these like what they look what they did to me. Yeah.

To protect this is revenge. You know, to turn the elf into something so horrible and so awful. Maybe.

Maybe there was a little bit of hate.

Yeah. Right. It was like, you're willing to go against me. You're willing to put me in confinement for ages. Yeah. And all for these people.

For creatures like these puny things. Yes. Maybe. Maybe there's some hate there. OK. OK. So he's at a point where he's kind of playing along with it, right? But he has this it is simmering, the simmering discontent. And so he starts, he's in this beautiful place now. He's with living with the other Valor. So he starts spreading some lies and there's elves and Valor and Valor or two. So they kind of they did gather the elves and kind of brought them to their their spot of life.

And I assume they are like working on re-beautifying the earth and like

dealing with some of what they're like they're sure there's elves. There are elves there. So they brought them. They brought them with them.

And nobody said to the elves, hey, just so you know, this melt or die. He's got a history. Yeah.

Like be wary. Yeah. Maybe they did. And the elves at this point were just so.

So yeah. And then so naive. Yeah. That they. So because it sounds like he was coming across very kind.

And like, I don't know. Like he had he had a mask. He had a mask he was using at this point. And so he goes to the elves and he said, the intentions of the Valor are not all clean. They haven't told you things. And guess what he says that they have not told the elves about?

They're planning. Oh, this is tough. I'm thinking like, man, I can't even think of a single evil thing.

I have no idea. So we're going to feed you to the dragons.

And if we're going to compare this to like a family with siblings, he tells them, you're not going to be the biggest sibling forever. Mom and dad are having another kid.

Shut up. Shut up. So he goes and he says, no, men are coming. Oh, no.

That would go straight to the heart of an elf. Men are coming and that would devastate them.

You know, you're not going to be the only thing here anymore.

And so how does he know men are coming? This is interesting because. Does he have inside knowledge or has Eru Eluvatar said

when I treat my beings, there's going to be more than one. So he did. He said there's going to be two iterations. Like when I have a first child or just like, I believe so. I believe so. When he was talking to you, I think he kind of laid out the plan.

Looking at the elves and they're just too young to know about men.

Or maybe they think like it's not going to matter. Yeah, like they're just like, yeah, you're the first beings. That's not a big deal. The elves are like, what?

This is a big deal. Say now. And so I love that. That is the drama.

So the dollar had not told them about this.

And so with this, he starts telling lies to I think there's a specific particular.

They're going to live longer. That's the life. But there's a couple of sections of the elves and there's one section of elves that are particularly like like listening to this or like kind of eating it. Do they have a name?

Like I think it's the Moldor.

Yeah, that sounds like I might have heard that once. And so the thought process, the lie here or the thought process is they brought you here so that when men come, men are going to dominate Middle Earth.

So that you are servants to them. You are just here and men are going to have the glory and men are going to take the land and men are going to inherit Middle Earth. And at this point, how we had dwarves. I don't. That's an interesting element.

Dwarves are coming. Dwarves are going to be before men. Yes. So he's talking about men. In this time of the trees. Yes.

So dwarves, I think, he's just spoiling them. But this is the main thing is for sure happening. He's writing that secret out.

Is the creator of men, whereas the dwarves go badly, but they were made by Owl, which is a Valar. And so I wonder if the elves are like not as intimidated by that.

I wonder. That's a good point. Maybe that's why they look down on them.

So they're not just because of the lofty heights. Yeah, it wouldn't it wouldn't hurt them in the same way. Yeah, it would hurt the siblings. Yeah, like this is the second child. The second children are coming and they are going to dominate the earth.

OK, I like that. Like you are not going to dominate the earth. They are. And so people are like, say what now? And there's a couple of people, particularly one, a nor, who's a prince. I've heard of this.

And we wait, we wait. Does it tell me if I'm right? Is this the one that has like a history with the lateral? Oh, I don't I don't know. I don't think so. She didn't give him hairs or something like that. Oh, no. Is that him?

That's Melkor. That's Melkor. Melkor freaking wanted Galadriel's hair and she said no. Wow. Isn't that wild?

Yeah, of course. Wild. OK, I didn't know it was Melkor. I thought it was this feymore guy or somebody with an F.

OK, because because we'll we'll get to a few things down the road. But so feymore is like a prince among these. You know, it's like a prince of the elves and he doesn't like Melkor.

OK, but he sees the truth in the lie. He's prideful and he's discontent with what where the the the the Noldor are right now. And he's like, I'm getting the impression visions of grandeur. Yeah. Right. He's like, no, I want to dominate the whole earth. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I want to be. I mean, it's like a lot of unexplored territory.

Like new cities built every day. Exactly. So he doesn't really like Melkor, but it's he's playing. Melkor is playing off his pride. Right. And so it's an easy situation.

Red button to push. So the Valor are like unaware that Melkor is going around spreading this, but there are they are realizing there's discontent. Like they're seeing discontent among the elves. The elves are getting frustrated. And then there's a point where feymore threatens to kill his brother from golfing and over this over some kind of like territory or

just over you get the impression over like the Val this question of if the Valor or the Valor are so Valor, the Valor are having this like ill intent towards them and if they need to do something to address this very divisive question, very divisive. And so at that point, the Valor are like, what the heck? Yeah. Whoa, hold your horses. What is going on like among the elves? And so they bring him, they bring him to testify and they say, what is going on?

What is going on? Does he say, well, Melkor told me, is he a snitch?

And this is the point where feymore says, Melkor told me. Fascinating. Melkor told me all of your secrets and that you're hiding this from me. And at this point, the Valor are like, no, not him again.

And so this is when they're like the jig is up. Right. Like we've realized that Melkor has been playing the elves. Against us, there is stuff going on. Now, I will also add in because we are going to read the Simmerallion and I'm so excited about this feymore. It's really interesting because he is the craftsman himself. There's so many creators in the storyline, but him and his family, I think, or actually it might just be him, but he creates the Simmeralls.

I've heard of these, but I don't know what they are.

They are stones. I believe there's three and they're from the light of the trees. Right.

So when the trees are destroyed, they like grab up the shattered leaves or something and they use them.

Actually, this is still in the era of the trees. They created these beautiful light sources.

Oh, they're just capturing light. But they were able to capture some light from the trees and create these stones. And they're they're very desirable. They're beautiful. I get the impression they might have some power. Are they in the rings of the elves?

They are not in the rings of the elves. But this is going to be the impetus. These Simmeralls are going to be the impetus behind centuries of war. Okay. The elves and Melkor and the dwarves.

This is where the disc is between the elves and the dwarves. These are beautiful precious stones. You can kind of think of them as like so the trees are like equivalent to having stones that include the power of the sun. Yeah. Right. Like extremely rare and beautiful. So he made this. So the elves made this. And I don't know if there's anyone else who's going in.

I think it was him. And so these are beautiful things. Right. And this kind of plays into the. So Melkor has this desire to use things, even if they're beautiful. We made, you know what I mean? He wants to use them for.

You almost think that like an evil person shouldn't be able to even look at or touch the dream. But no, he's like, I see opportunity.

Right. And so he wants the cimmerals and similar to Galadriel's hair. I think it was said that her hair was so glowy. It imitated like the light of the trees. And so he has this desire for beautiful things, but he doesn't have the desire to appreciate it.

He wants to possess it. Yeah. Right. And so that's why he asked Galadriel for hairs from her head.

That's why he asked, you know, he wants these cimmerals. So that's going on through all of this. But by the time they realized they've had this meeting and they realized shuts a little bit too late, deceived us. He's gone. He's gone. He recognizes the jig is up and he's left.

He's like, Oh, Fain or has a court date. I'll be in town.

I would be in town, but this is the thing. And this is the introduction of a really interesting character that I want to do a deep dive on. Angoliant. So I've heard this name.

Is this Shilob? This is Shilob's mother. Shilob's mother. We're talking matriarchy here.

And so I don't respect Tolton for coming up with the most disgusting names to describe his spiders. Angoliant and Shilob. Yeah, like, can you get a better spider name? You cannot.

Absolutely horrifying. Don't quite know what Angoliant is. We believe that Melkor found her kind of like in the void almost. There's just like this creature in the darkness. And I could be wrong. But I think she's almost like this reincarnation of the darkness in the world. Right. So you know how Arda is supposed to be the physical representation of the song, the creation song. Well, some of that darkness that Melkor sang

into the world has physically presented itself in certain ways. And we think from reading, Angoliant might be a piece of that darkness, a representative piece of the darkness in the world. Terrifying. So in the void. Yeah. And she's insatiably hungry.

Of course. So Melkor discovers Angoliant and he says, I have a use for you. And so he comes back with her and he destroys the two trees of Valinor. She eats them. She sucks them dry. Wow. Of sap. She sucks them dry, which I can't and she poisons them. Wow. So the trees are sucked dry and poisoned.

That's a very vivid imagery of like, I mean, I am assuming that Angoliant comes in spider form just because of what she looks like.

Yes, she is a spider form. That is a vivid imagery of like this nasty spider, huge, hanging onto this gorgeous tree. Gorgeous tree, sucking them dry. I want a painting of that. I know.

That's a cool painting. And poisons them so they can't come back. Yeah. Right. She doesn't just drain them, she poisons them. Yeah. And so they're withering and they're dying. Oh, geez. It's dark.

Why does he hate the light? Why does he hate the light? I don't know. Is he like nocturnal? I don't know.

And so, OK, so that's happened. And with all the fear and the confusion that's following, Melkor breaks into the fortress and he steals the cemerales along with other gems and things.

So all the things, their last little glimpse of light, the last because the light from the trees was in there. Geez.

And so he has this desire for possession, right? Where he's like, I'm not just going to come and like ruin

things, but I'm going to take the couple things. Yeah, it's weird. He has like this, I want you would think they were being in version.

Like the vampire to the cross or something similar, but there's clearly not.

There's not. There's almost this envy is lost and a lust for it. Yeah. But to do it, have it in his own way. So he grabs them and he and Goliath flee back to the north to his fortress. OK. This is the thing. At that point, and Goliath and Melkor have a little bit of a. Do they have it? An argument.

Oh, really? Because I mean, things are not all good and in camp evil. Yeah, it can't be evil.

And on Goliath is like, it sounds like almost endlessly hungry. Yeah. And she sees these simerians or the simerals and she thinks. That was tasty. And I think you just sucked the trees.

Aren't you like filled with power and life? And so.

Oh, no. He gave her some of the lesser treasures, but he would not give her the simerals. Uh-huh. And so she attacked him. Right. But because he went back to his fortress, he awakened. All of the Maya spirits that have followed him, the Balrogs, the creatures.

His moment of power here. He's got his place. And they come to his aid and they she gets pushed away and she disappears. Right. She's still on Arba. She's still technically, I think she lives like in the void or just like around. That there's a way to some amorphous place.

Yes, some amorphous place. So this is when the battles of elves and dwarves and eventually men against Morgoth start. So before now, he still has the similar else. And he has still has the similar else before now. We were just really seeing the Valar against Morgoth. And I will say this is when the elves have pulled themselves together, right? Because Feynors like, oh my gosh, he stole my things.

He stole my things and he slew his dad, the king of his, his group of elves. So this is also when his name changes. Feynor or Melkor. Yeah. So more.

Yeah. So Melkor. Melkor has his name change. Actually, let me see.

Oh, I thought it was him that that renamed himself. But I think it might not be. Let's see. So I'm reading it's like when Feynor found that his father is dead, he curses Melkor. And he renames him Morgoth. Oh, that's cool.

Dark enemy. I was curious. I was like, all right, if it was Melkor renaming himself, you know, you're the bad dude, what do you, how do you rename yourself?

Do you send out like? And I thought it was a little on the nose. Like enemy of the whatever. Exactly. Do you send down an email to everyone like, Hey guys, it's me, your enemy. Yeah.

I want to be called Morgoth now. Yeah. Don't refer to me by the old name. Yeah.

But I like it. I like that Feynor like curses him. He curses him and it's a, and like Melkor was never the name used by his enemies from that point in time. Okay. So I mean, it's more accurate. No, I want to call him Morgoth. The dark enemy. Yeah.

So he is in his fortresses, but this is a distinctive time because like I said before, the Valar used to be the only thing he was fighting at. Yep. Now he is angered that hopes. Yep. The dwarves are going to get in on this and he's created armies.

Humans are going to get in on this. He has been creating creatures that have been laying dormant throughout this whole time. And at this point, he is also starting to create armies of orcs. He's creating armies of all these other creatures as we know it. Yes.

He's breeding innumerable orcs, felbys, and he mounts the semirels on something called his iron crown. Oh, that's cool. Now, Feynour is the one who leads this first battle against him and he's like, I'm going to get my semirels back. Basically, I don't understand why it's not more about like, you're just evil and we want to get rid of you. I think that's a subtext of this, but there's

strangely a lot of greed and like other stuff around the semirels, which is why I think the history is called semorelion. Yeah. Because there's a lot of history about these, you know, beings fighting him about about being evil, but also in possession of these. Yeah. They're like really after the loot. It's like, yes, we should defeat the evil, but also it's fascinating because it almost almost.

It feels like the good for me. Yeah. And it will also feel like a prototype of the precious. Yeah. Right. Yeah.

That there's something like there's always something so tantalizing, so tempting. This this is very interesting. It's an interesting concept of like the item or the thing that

is just more motivating maybe than the morals, which is why I don't feel like this is exactly black and white. Yeah, I would reduce you.

Like obviously it's not at any point a good emotion.

Yeah, because more got is like has been terrible. And I think, you know, going to battle against it probably makes a lot of sense. Yeah. But also it's strange to me that there's this theme of desire

and it's going to cause a lot of like factional stress.

It's going to cause factual strife. But what's also interesting is there are some people who pursue the semirels for what they can get from them and their desire for them. And then over, you know, centuries of time, there's going to be people who are there because they're like, these are powerful and they're they're breaking people there and we want to destroy them.

You want to destroy them and we want to get rid of them. And so you're going to have different people who are going against Morgoth for different reasons. Yes, I love. And so that's what's fascinating about like recovering centuries here. This is where we have like the Baron Luthien myth of this amazing couple, which is the OG like man falling for an elvish one. We have multiple heroes.

We have a lendil towards the end. Oh, so dragons come out during this time. Like these are the centuries of battle. Yeah. But this is the thing that I don't fully understand.

And I think I'm going to have to go back and read more. It doesn't seem like the Valar are. Are they involved? Super involved. Like they're there helping, but they don't come out like they did when the elves. Yeah. Were there and they don't come out full battle cry.

And like from what I understand, and maybe I'm wrong and I have to correct this. Maybe it's because Meltor is also not doing that. Do you think he's just hiding out as well?

Well, he's going to war against his people.

He's sending his armies. Oh, he's on his arm, armor with his helm and everything.

They are coming and fighting him and he's fighting against them. And then a new army is coming and fighting against him and he's fighting against them.

Yeah, that's interesting that they should like be so.

So they're participating like there's things that they're doing to help. Yeah. But I don't get the sense that they're like straight out on the front of the house, they've abdicated that fight. Almost or like now that you're here and that you've had your own beef with them, like we're going to help you. We're going to be here. But this is where I feel like they kind of send the role of gods where they're like,

you're going to start making your own fate. That's interesting.

Where they this is your choice to go after the summer. This is your choice to engage with him. And like we were there to protect you, but you are making your own decision now. You decided to leave. Yeah. You decided to go after this. Yeah. And so we're going to be there to help you. We're going to be there to intervene a little bit.

But you're not fighting your battles for you on the ground. They're not on the ground. They're not boots on the ground, which is fascinating to me. Weird. Where they're kind of picking, I feel like they're saying, pick your own future. Yeah. Okay. And so all of this happens. There is a point, which is why I think Alendil is so powerful where he goes and he, he goes to the light of the star. Yeah. Okay. They they named the star after him. Oh, cute. Where he goes and he asked for the baller's help and he says, please help us. We're struggling. Uh-huh.

And so they decide to take pity. And so they come to Middle Earth and they confront Morgoth.

And this is the end of the first age.

All of this is happening in the first stage. Okay. This is not technically the end of the first age.

There's so much going on. I just haven't faced it. But this is defeat of Morgoth.

So they are, yeah, this is when they come and they're able to finally defeat Morgoth.

What does that mean? Does that mean he's just confined somewhere?

So this is the thing. He's utterly defeated, but the Valar cripple him and they bind him with a chain, which I think this is the chain at this point that Aole has created. And they take him away from the earth and they thrust him into the void. So he is just hanging out there.

So they bound him and then they threw him into the ocean essentially. Like they hid him as well.

This is the, so they say the timeless void.

It's kind of space. Yeah. They throw him out into space and he's chained. And that is the situation of Morgoth. At the time of the Lord of the Rings as we know it. So Lord of the Rings is dealing with all the remnants that they didn't clean up.

And so this is the thing. They get rid of a lot of the Balrogs. They get rid of a lot of the dragons.

So there were a lot more of the Balrogs than there were a lot more dragons.

There were a lot more of the dragons. There's a few, right? A few that were able to kind of hide and remain from this final battle. Oh, fascinating. And Soran was also able to escape and remain from this final battle.

So Meltore had like armies of Balrogs? Armies. That's wild.

I don't know how many. I don't know how many. But like more than one. But he had more than one. And I think from actually I was listening to this on a YouTube video, but I think there was some variety in his writings in terms of what he was like.

Oh, maybe there was a lot. And then he was like, oh, you're so powerful. I know, right? Maybe not that many, right?

And so there's been a different number, but he had multiple. Okay.

And so that's what's really interesting. When Gandalf sees. I think the Balrog is one of my favorite monsters.

When Gandalf sees the Balrog, he's like, this is an ancient creature. Yeah. And this is also a descendant from a Maya spirit. Right. So we're going to talk about that with Maya. Yeah, I love that.

But Maier, but he's like, this is not, this is on the same level of Gandalf. Right. Like this is not something. And this is an ancient, like he's saying this is ancient because this goes back all the way to Morgoth creating his fortresses and bringing in Maya spirits.

To the very, to the first pre-emptive strike. So almost the foundation of the world before elves were, before dwarves, before men. So he's like, you don't know what you're against. And that is so interesting because you, you see this and you think, man, he's not, he's like run. Yeah. Run. He, yeah. He means it. This is very interesting because when you see, I did not understand when, when Gandalf was against the Balrog, I see it as Gandalf against the big monster. Yeah. And I don't see it as Gandalf facing something as ancient as he is. As ancient.

Gandalf more powerful. Also, you know, I don't know if everyone knew each other by name,

but there's a sense of like your source was also my source. At some point we were the same.

We were the same and that's so disconcerting. And that's like a different, a different type of battle. Yeah. Then like you're just a creepy thing. I don't like you. No, that's very different. And it's also interesting because the way it's then set out in Tolkien's world, like the way he has defined a wizard, that is such a powerful creature, but we see Gandalf as being so personable, or at least to some extent personable, at least with the hobbits, you know. And so, but it's, it feels like the wizard has kind of been, he's kind of been nerfed because like a wizard is just like, oh, he can cast spells. A wizard in fantasy is not. He's an ancient spirit. He's an ancient spirit.

Not human. You know what I mean? Like it has changed, it has been diluted from Tolkien to the concept of a wizard in Tolkien. I did not understand how different that concept was. And it's really cool.

And the potential. I prefer it by a lot. So I just say too is that the source of, and yeah, we should save this for another episode, but the source of his spirit, like being a Meyer spirit, he has capacity to grow and to change. Like this Valor came from the same thing that he was. And so we think like, oh, you're stuck. You're stuck in your personality or your skills. It's not the case. Yeah.

Very cool. Someday you can be a Balrad too, Daniel. Yeah.

If you wish, I guess.

And so that's the point where now he has been defeated and Soran is in like this hiding mode. And that is, I believe, the end of the first age. And the beginning of the second age is Soran coming out and kind of this fake mask and starting to manipulate the people of Numenor.

And so the second age. So he starts with Numenor. He doesn't start with the elves. He starts with the men. He starts with them. That's interesting. I thought he started with the elves. And what's fascinating is there was something I read earlier that I thought was interesting is so men are born, right? And this is after the destruction of the trees, but Melkor realizes that they're easier to convince than elves are. And so even though.

And he tells everyone. He's like, yo. And so I think that caused a little bit of enmity between the elves and the men because the elves, I think, are pretty much been against Melkor this whole time. But the men weren't always on gear. You know what I mean? Like they weren't always. Why did you create these weak siblings

for us that are going to ruin everything? And they were a little antagonistic towards you. I think there was a specific area and time where they're like, we don't want men here. Of course. Like you are not going to enter our realm, right? And so there's a little bit of antagonism where they look down on men. They say you're so easily corrupted. Yeah. Right.

Because you feel that disdain in the Lord of the Manes as it is.

To be fair, the enmity towards Melkor is like in their blood. It's like that disturbance between Melkor and it was to be fair, it was like a noldor elf. But a very specific person and their heritage has caused some kind of enmity between them. And even maybe the orcs, right? Where you're like, we see how evil you are. Yeah.

We've been there. And it's what you said with Gandalf and Balroth. They're coming from the same. Yeah. You are the twisted version of me. Yeah.

So like I see. And it's almost like the, what is it called? Like the paradox of the heretic. Yeah. How people hate the heretic more than they hate the unbeliever.

Right? Because the heretic almost like the heretic used to believe or was closer to the truth or whatever. And it's true.

They hate the heretic more than the unbeliever. Wild. So. So I do think that's interesting that they have kind of, I feel like this deeper, this deeper history and then are not entirely always on the side with them. And then the dwarves, it sounds like the dwarves and the elves had some beef over the simmeralls.

Right. Which makes sense because both of these, I mean, how can you resist something so beautiful? Obviously. But like dwarves themselves are just like, they are so into. They're craftsmen. The craft. They're so into the gem.

Something created this beautiful. Yeah. It's just like, it feels right. Yeah. So there's some beef there because it originated by elves. Created by elves. But they want it. They want it. So there's some history there to dig into a lot of stuff. But this is basically where Morgoth is in the time of Lord of the Rings and the story. And so Soran has his moment.

This is all the stuff that they covered in that two second prologue. Yes. Yes. No, no, it's the second before that.

Actually, no, this is the days before days.

Oh my gosh. This is the pre-prologue. Yeah. And so the second age is basically kind of Soran, coming into power. Coming into power. Using the same playbook as Malkor.

Kind of using the same playbook, being sneaky at first. And then fully coming out and creating his own, not a similar, but his own object of power and desire, which was the ring. Perfect. And it also incites greed, right?

The ring and other creatures. And so it's interesting because it's a little bit of a play, a power play for himself. But the second age is him coming to play.

But then when he gets shut down by a Sildor and the ring taken, that's the end of the second age beginning of the third. That's right. That's right. So all of that happens while Morgoth is in the void. And now, so the future, what does the future hold? Tell me. We know that there are multiple ages. There's a couple of different writings. Supposedly the Semerlian keeps things open. Where it says, no one but Eru knows, right?

Like the future of what is going to happen. Oh, we know he's not telling anybody. But there are writings where Tolkien talks about an ultimate battle. And it very much gives in my mind, like Second Company or Ragnarok from Norse themes. I'm trying to find what is the name of this battle because it's really interesting. It's got to be like Armageddon, something equivalent to that.

Yeah, it's a similar vibe where Melkor or Morgoth gets unloosed. And there's a final battle of Dagor Dagoroth. The Dagor Dagoroth. Fascinating. And it's where Morgoth is going to return. And there's going to be a battle.

And there's no hint as to like, and then he'll be defeated, right?

It says in this writing, it has him being defeated.

But this was not considered final enough to enter the Semerlian. And so in the Semerlian, he leaves it very open that if the Valar know how the end of Arda will present itself, they have not revealed it.

And so that's why I kind of think like he had this one where he was like, okay, Melkor comes, he's defeated. But part of me wonders if there's going to be a different ending, right? Like a redemption or something where because we know.

It's so hard to want redemption for him after all he's done, but it's so interesting. But it's so interesting because we know that Iru has said anything that you create is going to be ultimately absorbed into my creation in my life.

Yeah, and maybe just something similar to Golan where like the final scene that Melkor tries to do in that last battle causes this ultimate good thing to happen. You know.

And so he is not. Very intriguing. He is not the main character of Lord of the Rings, but I feel like he's almost the main character of Tolkien's world. All of the drama and all of the situations and. Everyone has a relationship with him. Everything has a relationship to him. And he is what is like, what would life be on Middle Earth? I can't say that it wouldn't be better.

Life would be better without holding together the whole mess.

But also like I feel, I don't know. I just wonder what Tolkien's view of him was. And maybe I need to read through more of it

because I think there's something here that's really interesting about the villain being the main character. So anyways, a super interesting person. I'm excited to learn more as we read the Civil War Lian and dig into this. But thank you so much for listening, guys. We're really excited.

We'll see you on the next one. We'll be pursuing this. Yes, and we'll see you on the next one.

Take care.