Rings of Power gives us the Orcs we need
The morally grey spin on the ‘monstrous horde’ is deeply rooted in Tolkien lore
*Spoilers for Episode 3 and Episode 8 of Amazon’s The Rings of Power*
‘In my story, I do not deal in Absolute Evil. I do not think there is such a thing’.
J.R.R. Tolkien’s private note on The Lord of the Rings, the epic trilogy that birthed modern fantasy as a genre, offers a fascinating counter-point to the most maligned race within his books-Orcs. Portrayed as malevolent monsters, reminiscent of the amoral evil of Grendel in Beowulf (a work that Tolkien sought to emulate in his own rendition of a grand epic), the servants and foot-soldiers of the Dark Lord appear as little more than plot devices that threaten the heroes of the story.
Rings of Power offers a glimpse of more. In its third episode, the half billion dollar Amazon blockbuster TV series made headway in giving alternate canon its due through the mysterious figure of Adar. Sindarin for ‘Father’, he refers to Orcs as his ‘children’, defending their right to exist to a scornful and sceptical Galadriel, who, in this rendition, appears to have more in common with a D&D elf warrior than the ethereal Sorceress of the Golden Wood.
‘Each one has a name, a heart. We are creations of the One, Master of the Secret Fire, the same as you. As worthy of the breath of life and just as worthy of a home.’
Boom! This claim made by the presumably corrupted Elf holds reams of meaning for all,who, in the case of Orcs, do not presume to see ‘the end beyond doubt’, as Tolkien would say.
Orcs-The ‘Damaged Good’?
Certainly, names are of paramount interest in The Lord of the Rings.
The appendices in The Return of the King (which Amazon Prime used to cobble together it’s own cinematic take on the Second Age) testify to this, containing, as they do, a wealth of family trees for Men, Elves, Dwarves and Hobbits. One might argue that because Orcs are not listed, they are clearly meant as little more than a scourge on the face of Middle Earth yet it has to mean something if Tolkien stoops to name and single out the likes of Ugluk, Shagrat and Gorbag in the horde of ‘squat, broad, flat-nosed, sallow-skinned, wide mouthed and slant eyed’ creatures.
Tolkien describes their (specifically, Shagrat and Gorbag’s) reluctance to serve the Evil Eye, their desire to escape ‘and set out on their own with a few trusty lads’ as well as their fear when it comes to the Lord of the Nazgul. Of course, this being Orcs, it’s not all roses but the narrative hints at some of their positive character traits, such as a warped appreciation for discipline, hard work and valour in battle (ex. how Saruman’s Uruk-Hai despise mountain Orcs for running at the first sign of trouble). Orcs even have an appreciation for rudimentary ‘art’, given the mention of a gruesome sword hilt in The Two Towers.
But most telling of all is there capability to sing crude battle songs.
Singing is not just a mark of hope and beauty in Middle Earth but also the means by which Elves awaken trees and Tom Bombadil masters his little woodland realm-Sam and Frodo notably overcome the malevolent force guarding the doors of Mordor by singing the name of Elbereth, something that even staggers the Lord of the Nazgul. The fact that Orcs can still sing whereas the Nine cannot is a clue that, for all their corruption, redemption, though supremely unlikely, is not off the table for them.
There may not be enough meat in the story (yet!) to have us root for Orcs Game of Thrones style but these bits and pieces, supplemented by what Tolkien himself wrote about the race in his extensive legendarium (The Book of Lost Tales, The Silmarillion and the chapter Morgoth’s Ring in The History of Middle Earth go into depth on Orc origin, should you be interested) can make one hope.
This is also because Orcs, as Adar says, are ‘creations of the One, Master of the Secret Fire’.
If you refer to The Silmarillion, Tolkien’s version of a creation myth for his story, Iluvatar created Arda (essentially Earth, with all the countries and people of Middle Earth) by setting the Secret Flame, the divine force of creation, at its heart. This power of creation also went into the making of each living being’s Fëa or soul, that which makes them rational, intelligent beings capable of free will. If you give credence to the idea that Orcs were originally corrupted Elves and Men, creatures made of that selfsame ‘Secret Fire’, it stands to reason that they are owed some form of leniency. Because they did not choose to be corrupted and were not ‘evil from the start’.
Given his Catholic sensibilities, Tolkien must also have struggled with the idea of someone that cannot be saved. (There are some strains of Catholicism that argue Judas, the man who technically committed the most heinous sin against God and mankind could have been saved if only he repented for a moment at the gallows.)
There is also the idea of ‘the good of continued existence’ , which Tolkien must have grappled with. This refers to an idea that states that we all exist because God wills it-even the worst among us continue to exist, without instantaneously dropping dead for their crimes.
It follows that, if they are suffered to be, Orcs in that sense must be a race ‘divinely willed’.
This is something Tolkien also admitted in Letter 153 of Morgoth’s Ring:
They [Orcs] would be Morgoth’s greatest Sins, abuses of his highest privilege, and would be creatures begotten of Sin, and naturally bad. (I nearly wrote “irredeemably bad’; but that would be going too far. Because by accepting or tolerating their making — necessary to their actual existence — even Orcs would become part of the world, which is God’s and ultimately good).
Fair is foul and Foul is Fair
The problem is that in the world Orcs are supposed to be a part of, everything is stacked against them from the get-go.
Middle-Earth is a place where outward beauty often corresponds to goodness. Noble brows, grey eyes, silver or golden tresses,a white, luminescent glow-these are the traits we come to admire in Elves and High (Numenoreans, like Aragorn) and Middle Men (like Éomer). Tolkien has Orcs be ‘squat, broad, flat-nosed, sallow-skinned, wide mouthed and slant eyed’, with little to admire physically.
Hobbits, who are not traditionally ‘fair folk’ have at least their red cheeks and merry air to endear themselves to everyone from Treebeard to the men of Rohan and Gondor. Dwarves, bearded and grim, are given a face-lift with Gimli (something Rings of Power does exceedingly well with dwarven King and Queen Durin and Disa, two characters that supply much needed humour in what would otherwise be a very high-handed series), the one dwarf who counts the Lady Galadriel as more beautiful than any gem he could mine under the Earth, astonishing the Elves with his unexpected way with words (Just read his description on the merits of the Glittering Caves and you will know what I mean!)
Orcs are not extended the same courtesy, being ugly, deformed and cruel as a default.
But I’ve always taken these descriptions with a grain of salt.
Being of South Asian origin, having the ‘dark, cruel’ Haradrim stand in opposition to both ‘Gandalf the White’ and the noble white men of Gondor with their keen grey eyes does make me think. I know that Tolkien was the farthest thing from a racist (he opposed a German translation of his work when they asked for proof of his ‘Aryan origin’) yet a subconscious bias of his times shines through in this instance. (His class consciousness, exemplified in Sam’s at times slavish dedication to his ‘elvish Master’ Frodo is one example for this that hasn’t aged well, probably one reason why the two of them appear more as friends and equals rather than as master and servant in the Peter Jackson film trilogy.)
It would not matter so much that Orcs are ugly if ugliness was a trait that could also hide a good self. But the fact that moral ugliness translates into physical ugliness is a core idea of the story. We see this when characters are such as Bilbo or Gollum are tempted by the Ring. Their features become distorted, that inner darkness made real physically.
What chance does an Orc, ugly, already formed by means of moral corruption and therefore evil from the get-go, have to act differently?
It is not surprising that Morgoth, Sauron and Saruman can extend a hold on the race seeing as they have no viable alternative. Adar’s narrative of finding a place his children can call their home and his anger at Sauron for seeing Orcs only as a tool he can experiment on is something many disenfranchised people can actively sympathize with, however ‘fell’ or ‘foul’ their deeds end up being. (Am I alone in finding that last scene in the Rings of Power season finale where Adar sits in the red gloom of Mount Orodruin, surrounded by his children, strangely cathartic?)
Though Tolkien does not ultimately afford Orcs their own redemptive arc in his writings, even in his version of the apocalypse that would entail a healing and renewal of the world, it clearly weighed on his mind.
The New Shadow, a planned sequel to the Lord of the Rings, deals with the rise of evil in Gondor that has men succumb to deeds of ‘orkish malice’ as the defeated race seeks to revenge itself on the victors. Tolkien abandoned the story for being too bleak but the idea behind it, that of a race perpetually stuck in the mire, resentful of a position that allows them no leeway in terms of possible redemption, evokes sympathy.
After all, good and evil are always precariously balanced.
When I read Beren and Luthien, Tolkien’s original original star-crossed Elf-Human love story, I was fascinated by the fact that Morgoth himself, for an instance, was entranced by Luthien’s dance to the point of distraction, showing an appreciation for beauty and goodness that recalls his former nature as a Valar, a greater God and intended force for good created by Iluvatar. (Rings of Powers pays homage to this state of affairs by explaining that, at one point, he had to look away from the Silmarils he ultimately stole because their beauty threatened to move his heart towards goodness.)
The temptation of Gandalf, Galadriel and Frodo as well as Denethor’s descent into despair, which has him adopt a custom of the Dark Kings who served Sauron-namely, dying and killing a yet living family member to ‘ease their own passing’, as Gandalf puts it, proves that everyone is fallible. Fëanor and Turin (refer to The Silmarillion for more) show that Tolkien actually did understand the nature of morally grey characters. Put together, his efforts in this vein feed into something he said in relation to fighting in the trenches during World War I-’we are all Orcs’.
Yet, in some ways, I’d argue, Orcs are better than us.
Whereas the above mentioned characters succumb to evil out of their own free will, the corrupted Orcs act like automatons. Their evil is intrinsically linked to the will of Sauron, the story stating that their reach and population waned and thrived according to the Shadow’s influence.
In The Hobbit, set 80 years before the War of the Ring, Orcs (or goblins, as they are called in the book) live under mountains in their own underground realms, fighting and killing, yes, but mostly picking off travellers in skirmishes and ambushes rather than waging all-out war against them. The concerted efforts of building a war machinery and mustering troops are not things that come naturally to them but are part of a process instigated by the will of Sauron or Saruman. The confusion and their desire to flee once the Ring is destroyed shows how much of their free will was actually subsumed.
As Tolkien wrote, ‘Deep in their dark hearts, the Orcs loathed the Master whom they served in fear, the maker only of their misery.’
Prometheus, Fire and Orcs
In their servitude, however, Orcs still manage to challenge the status quo.
Their love for fire and everything artificial has them build elaborate machines and cause gigantic explosions. As such, for all their destructive potential, Orcs are also on the forefront of what would be technological advancement if anyone in Middle Earth cared for automation beyond the use of a hand mill. Thus, in their fallen state, Orcs in their ‘devilry’ emulate Prometheus, the Titan who stole fire from the Gods to give it to humans, providing them with the means to life.
In real life, Tolkien was deeply sceptical of technological progress, showcased by his hobbits who are happy to live in a green idyll of peace and plenty that offers contentment without diversion. (You eat, drink, smoke, visit your neighbours and go on walks in the countryside-a life that many of us claim to envy but few could enjoy without any kind of change for the rest of said life.) The machinations of Mordor were a kind of ‘dark magic’ to him, one that thrived in our world under the name of science. (Lord of the Rings was intended as a kind of pre-history to our modern world.) ‘The serious magical endeavour and the serious scientific endeavour are twins: one was sickly and died, the other strong and throve,’ he argued.
There is another, paradoxical reading of the tale of the ‘slow decline of all that was once fair’-one in which Mordor becomes the quintessential City of Enlightenment, poised to spark an Industrial Revolution in Middle Earth, with technology conceived as a means to bring peace and prosperity to the common people. Here, Gandalf ‘the White’ is a fanatic representing the imperialist interests of Gondor as well as the racial hatred of the Elves, seeking a ‘final solution for Orcs’ (a slur that, in this instance, is used by men of the West use to disparage foreigners, harking back to Tolkien’s iconic ‘We were all Orcs’) while Sauron is forward thinking enough to pass a universal literacy law.
For it’s hick-ups (it’s fan fiction, albeit impressively written), Kirill Eskov’s The Last Ringbearer provides an intriguing perspective on the story we all think we know.
Tolkien was an obvious monarchist, given the way Aragorn is idealised as the last true king who will bring things ‘to right’. Social advancement in The Lord of The Rings is slow and creeping, with even the Riders of Rohan still not afforded the same status as the Men of Gondor even after nigh a millennia of being allies. Marriage is mostly a union of equals-another reason why Aragorn could not stoop to marrying Eowyn, his marriage to Arwen, despite their mutual love being a convenient means to re-unify the existing strands of the half-elven line. Boromir’s ‘Gondor has no king. Gondor needs no king’ line in the film version of The Fellowship of The Ring is steeped in resentment, given that the stewards of Gondor are asked to rule a city in all but name for many long years only to be required to make way on the first instance ‘the true king’ returns.
Given these connotations, its possible to see the storm on Minas Tirith as something corresponding to the storm on St.Petersburg during the Russian Revolution, with Orcs and the Haradrim representing the colonised and the proletariat, the ‘ugly black horde’ against the majestic might of the royalists of Gondor who only fight to maintain the status quo.
As such, an inkling of sympathy for the Orcs does not feel out of place.
Like the ‘evil men’, they are caught between the wrecking ball of Sauron and Saruman, living in both contempt and fear of the whole world. Certainly, these are no noble freedom fighters but given the fact that they are beings with both personalities and souls, their fate does evoke pity.
Especially considering that they have certain traits that, channelled effectively, would be beneficial to other races in Middle Earth. This is their capacity of feeling at ease with their own nature-unlike the Numenoreans who yearned for the immortality of the Elves or the Elves who wished for both the undying beauty of Valinor and the preservation of Middle Earth at all costs, desires that would ultimately doom them. Orcs also manage to do something even the Elves never did-the power of sub-creation. Their fires and instruments of doom are inventions of their own, while Elves, one could argue, only manage and maintain the forests that already are. In this sense, Orcs do something only the Valar manage, making something both new and of their own invention. (Of course, these are horrendous inventions but channelled in the right way, they could be useful. One can’t help but wonder what ingenuity a dwarf-ork alliance might birth.)
Rings of Power might not give Orcs a Happy Ending. Or even make them likeable. Perhaps, that is not even warranted. But the series definitely holds true to Tolkien’s lore by providing the race with a culture of its own (replete with funeral customs!), proving that they are more than cannon fodder. Minor change or not, that’s not too bad for a sub-set of creatures considered evil incarnate and capable only of destruction for the longest time.
