Not to be out-Tolkien-nerded by Jack Butler, I feel compelled to rise to the defense of J. R. R. Tolkien’s creation against some poor choices regarding the character of Galadriel that are apparent in the first two episodes of Amazon’s The Rings of Power, to which Jack has given a cautiously optimistic review.
Let me get four things out of the way up front. One, I am not trashing the show; I generally enjoyed the first two episodes and am likely to stick it out unless and until it really decides to abandon the path of wisdom by breaking Tolkien’s work to find out what it is. Two, I’m not much invested in weighing in at length on the tempest in a teapot over multiracial casting; while I prefer casting decisions that are faithful to the original work and am skeptical of the motives of Hollywood in prioritizing “representation” of the audience over representing the actual characters as conceived by an author, the choice of actors in the first two episodes has fit comfortably within Tolkien’s vision. If anything, Tolkien emphasized the visible differences among the races of Middle-Earth precisely in order to demonstrate the need for their cooperation in a great cause in spite of their divergent natures and folkways. Interestingly, given Tolkien’s original vision of his work as an English mythology, the accents and behavior of the Dwarves and the proto-Hobbit Harfoots in this series seem to drive home that they are identified with the Scots and the Irish, respectively. Third, I am not such a purist that I object to adding new things to flesh out Tolkien’s story, which in the Second Age of Middle-Earth is especially sparse, so long as additions do not detract or subtract from what he has already created.
Fourth, my complaint with the presentation of the character of Galadriel is not about the choice to make her a warrior. We know, from Tolkien’s writings, that Galadriel was not a warrior in the wars with Morgoth that consumed the First Age, having instead spent most of that time in the peaceable forest kingdom of Doriath. We similarly know that she was not a warrior in the Third Age, having settled in the new, peaceable forest kingdom of Lothlórien in order to maintain it as a refuge. Nonetheless, it is consistent with the character of Galadriel for her to have spent much of the Second Age of Middle-Earth in armor fighting Sauron. We know that her personality is fierce and domineering, and that she was an implacable foe of Sauron who had been close with her brother Finrod Felagund, who died at Sauron’s hand. (The Rings of Power presents Finrod as having died “hunting Sauron,” which is incorrect; he died fulfilling a vow to Beren, but he nonetheless was killed by Sauron. This is an unnecessary but forgivable simplification.) We know that Elf-women are said to be equal in strength and agility to the men, and that they spent only a tiny portion of their lifespan in bearing children, so female Elf-warriors are not that hard to envision. We know that, while Tolkien’s view of women did not ordinarily depict them as soldiers, he was quite capable — witness the character of Eowyn — of writing fierce female warriors.
To Tolkien devotees, however, there are still two problems with Galadriel as she appears in The Rings of Power. The first: Where is her family? We know that she married Celeborn long before the end of the First Age, and that theirs was such a powerful love that she forsook her own kin — with whom she had braved the terrible crossing of the grinding ice of the Helcaraxë — in order to reside with Celeborn’s people in Doriath. It is further written, or at least suggested, that it was in the early centuries of the Second Age that she gave birth to her only child, her daughter Celebrían, who is important in the story because she eventually marries Elrond. Yet, when The Rings of Power shows Galadriel being sent off by Gil-galad to leave Middle-Earth and return across the sea to Tol Eressëa, there is not even the slightest suggestion that there might be a problem with leaving behind her husband and daughter. This is entirely inconceivable, either that it would be commanded or that her response would not focus on the separation of her husband. (For that matter, we get a scene where Elrond seems to be making goo-goo eyes at the woman who becomes his mother-in-law.) Even if we can accept Galadriel spending years at a time away from home on a military mission against Sauron, this makes no sense with the character Tolkien wrote. The only known example provided by Tolkien of a marriage separated by a return of one spouse to Aman is, ironically, when Celebrían returns without Elrond, and this is presented as a tragedy caused by her wounding by orcs.
The second problem is the relationship between Galadriel and Gil-galad. As High King of the Noldor, Gil-galad would enjoy great respect and significant influence over the deployment of Elven military forces. But it is ridiculous in two ways to present him as having the power to silence Galadriel and order her across the seas. One, that is not how the politics of the Elves worked. The Silmarillion is full of incidents that illustrate that the High King ruled more by consensus than by dictatorial power, and often had tremendous difficulty getting the other Noldorin princes to go along with his priorities. He was more like a Native-American war chieftain negotiating the allegiance of related tribes than like a modern generalissimo. He would be within his rights in reprimanding Galadriel for disobeying orders in where and how she led his warriors, but he could scarcely be expected to have the power to order Galadriel as to where she lived. Two, Galadriel is the first cousin of his father Fingon, a previous High King, and is thousands of years older than Gil-galad. She is, at the time depicted in the show, the only surviving member of the generation of Noldorin leaders who led their people in rebellion against the Valar and into Middle-Earth. She would accordingly be seen as an elder stateswoman with prestige and honor among the Elves unrivaled by anyone besides the High King himself. Ordering her around is about the last thing Gil-galad would do.
The richness of Tolkien’s world — which birthed the entire fantasy genre — is uniquely unsuited to being tampered with, and there is a powerful case both commercially and artistically against doing so. None of these decisions were in any sense necessary in order to tell a compelling story. Let us hope that the remainder of the series is more faithful to Tolkien’s vision (including the deeply theological Downfall of Númenor) in portraying the events of the Second Age.