[ SECRET POST #5175 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #5175 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.


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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 03 pages, 57 secrets from Secret Submission Post #741.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[philstar22]

This is exactly what makes Sauron so fascinating to me. He goes from a good maia to an evil but intelligent maia who plans and scenes and is able to pretend to be good and corrupt others and then post-Numenor goes full-on what is his former master was without any of the subtlety he used to be able to pull off and then without the Ring he's just a shell who only manages to win things because Third Age people just aren't as good as those who came before.

It takes him longer, but by the end he's just as corrupted as Melkor was. Melkor was stuck in a badly injured body that wouldn't heal. Sauron gets stuck in an ugly body he can't use for trickery and then just plain loses his body altogether once the Ring is destroyed. He really does end up being a mirror of Melkor even though in a lot of ways they were very different.

[(Anonymous)]

Exactly. What was his "gateway drug"? Was it love and loyalty to Melkor? It very well might have been, in the beginning. Creating a cult in his honor is kind of touching, really. There's a suggestion, I think in HoME that Sauron was offered at least one opportunity to return to the Valar's good graces, but refused. How does this compare to other Maiar who did follow Melkor for a while and then renounced him, like Ossë?

[philstar22]

There's also the fact that he's the one that Melkor puts in charge when he's imprisoned in Mandos the first time. He's Melkor's Lieutenant. And there's a line about Sauron having a hand in all Melkor's works. So there's a level trust there and of power sharing that isn't there with anyone else. All Melkor's other servants are just servants for the most part, and serve him out of fear and because he's actually used his power to physically change them to serve his needs (balrogs were maia actually reshaped by him, in at least one version orcs were once elves). So what is it about Sauron that makes him different, that made Melkor see him as someone to share his work with, to share power with?

[(Anonymous)]

It's all so interesting! Unlike a lot of Melkor's other creatures, Sauron had versatility and creativity, and Melkor didn't twist those qualities out of him. He wasn't an equal of course, but he wasn't a mere minion either. Exactly, there's collaboration there and even a form of trust.

(Sauron absolutely loved getting ear-skritches in wolf form, that is an unshakeable headcanon.)

[(Anonymous)]

My hopes for the Amazon series aren't high quality-wise, but if we get a fraction of this kind of material about Sauron (who was canonically hot before Númenor) I'll be happy.