Itâs very confusing to me how some refuse to accept that Mairon/Sauron can feel âhuman-likeâ emotions like love or lust, while projecting human-like traits like ânarcissismâ or âsociopathyâ onto his character.
Sauron is a immortal deity, who was created by Eru himself. Heâs one of the Ainur; he helped shape the world during the AinulindalĂ«, the âmusic of the Ainurâ. He looks at Middle-earth in ruins and thinks the Valar have forsaken it. He steps in because, in his mindset, heâs the only deity willing to do something about it. Of course heâs âarrogantâ, and thinks he owns the place. He helped creating it, in the first place.
You all also conveniently forget just how alike Sauron and Galadriel actually are, and why they are each others foils to begin with. Many of you are falling into the same trap as the âlorebrosâ by ignoring that character arcs exist and that âRings of Powerâ Galadriel is thousands of years away from her Third Age persona. Sheâs not the âLady of Lightâ yet, and even Sauron himself has just begun his âDark Lordâ arc.
Not only Sauron and Galadriel are both arrogant, but self-righteous, too. They both love to be on power-trips. They lie left and right, and manipulate others to get their way. We saw Galadriel do this in both Season 1 and 2, already. They both use others for their own ends. They donât care about rules, they are their own authority. They are used to get their way, and get pissed when they donât. They both turned their backs on the Valar (returning to Valinor/refusing their judgement) for the same reason: pride. They know each others minds because they are alike.
Of course Sauron wants her as his queen; sheâs the perfect pair for him. And together they would, indeed, wreck havoc. This would be a power couple of nightmares, for everyone around them. There would be no escaping them, they would enslave everyone to their will. They are both beautiful, and Sauron is seductive. He already brought this side of Galadriel to the surface in Season 1, when we saw her flirting with him (and this is probably the explanation for Tolkien approval of Boormanâs script).
I read a lot of people saying that Sauron would destroy Galadrielâs light if she joined him. Actually, she would be far worse than Sauron. Tolkien did say that Gandalf would be worse than Sauron if he had the One Ring, and this is true for Galadriel as well. Which explains these quotes from her:
She recognizes this, sheâs not that self-deluded. Sheâs talking about herself on a power-trip, not about how Sauron would âdestroyâ her.
This headcanon (and Iâve seen this in the Galadriel x Sauron fandom, too) that Galadriel is some âpure of heart she-elf, holy and divine-like characterâ is extremely bizarre, because this is not what we are being shown in âRings of Powerâ. Nor is it what Tolkien himself wrote. For starters, Tolkien, being extremely religious, would never copy-paste his faith into magical elves. The characters that are granted with that imprint are the Valar themselves because they are meant to be of divine nature (the actual Gods of his lore). And Tolkien himself went back and forward with this idea, too. Maybe he felt it was too blasphemous, I donât know.
This will be my wildest take yet, but Halbrand turning out to be Sauron is a aphrodisiac for Galadriel, actually. She wanted the king, yes, because the smith wasnât good enough. But at the end of the day, Halbrand was a Southlander, a âlow manâ: Galadriel tells him this once they arrived at NĂșmenor in 1x03 (âthese men are not like youâ). But he turned out to be the most powerful being around, and he wants her at his side. And you can bet that only makes her want him even more. And Sauron is probably aware of this, too.
This is why heâs grinning here: you thought I was a mere âlow manâ, did you? Even with him on his repentant era, we saw Maironâs self-control in Season 1. He allowed Galadriel to say all kinds of arrogant stuff to him, and saved this grin for last. His pride was the reason why he couldnât bring himself to face the Valarâs judgment, after all.
Besides: was she truly deceived by Sauron, or did she deceived herself, in Season 1? Because sheâs the one who kept pushing the king of the Southlands onto him, and even acted behind his back with Queen MĂriel. This is why Elrond calls her out on her bullsh*t on Season 2: âit was entirely of your choosingâ. She wanted the lost king who could ride her to victory, and Sauron delivered.
Thereâs a lot of misunderstanding of the kind of villain Sauron actually is. Heâs a cautionary tale of âbe careful of what you wish forâ. Thatâs why heâs the seductive power that makes every dream come true. Listen to Adar, heâs the one who spills the tea in âRings of Powerâ. Sauron is a sharer of gifts, a wish granter, but it comes with a cost. And heâs not âchaotic evilâ, heâs pure âlawful evilâ; heâs methodic, a control freak and highly organized. And thatâs why heâs able to gain an insane amount of power for a mere Maia.
Indeed it was; Galadriel went to Eregion, is standing there, and has the Nine, because itâs by Sauronâs design. Everything he did was to culminate in this scene. Heâs a mastermind, he planned everything. And you all actually believe it was Elrond on that tent, as if Sauron, the control freak, would let anything to chance. As he so cynically says, himself:
Sauron was able to perceive Finrod, Beren & co infiltrated his fortress masquerading as Orcs, because the Orcs were acting weird. This is how calculating he truly is. Morgoth was the brute force, Sauron was the mind. And you can bet Morgothâs overworked secretary Sauron had everything catalogued, curated and organized by size, shape and color, back at Angband fortress. He had that thing running like clockwork. He was created as a Maia of order, after all.
For my Zodiac enthusiastics out there: this villain is peak Virgo energy. Everyone associates Sauron with fire, but nah, his whole personality is Earth element-coded (and AulĂ« himself is very connected with Earth element, not only by creating mountains and gems/minerals, but heâs also married to âQueen of the Earthâ, Yavanna).
He did had some bumps along the way: killing Celebrimbor in a rage fit, and Galadriel getting captured by Adar, but it all worked out for him in the end (except Galadriel throwing herself off a cliff, he wasnât counting on that one, either):
We saw him lose control in âRings of Powerâ and acting chaotic because it was meant to symbolize his return to âhis old waysâ, his fall into evil again, into Morgothâs servitude. Morgoth was âchaotic evilâ, he was the nihilistic God who wanted to destroy and corrupt everything Eru created. This is not Sauronâs character at its core.
And this is not âgaslightingâ either. This is Sauron actually talking facts. It was Celebrimborâs arrogance and vanity that allowed him to âfall preyâ to Sauron. And he, indeed, chose it. Because Celebrimbor wanted to surpass FĂ«anor, he wanted to craft legendary objects, he wanted to create a mythos like his grandfatherâs Silmarils. And Sauron gave him just that. Celebrimborâs sins are pride (vanity), greed and envy.
Celebrimbor couldnât care less about Halbrand (the âlow manâ); he used his knowledge and then forgot about him, not because Galadriel told him to, but because Halbrand was no longer useful to him. He had already forged the Three Elven rings of power (to help the Elves cheat death). And is with this that Sauron tempts him, again. And he becomes the emissary of the Valar because thatâs what Celebrimbor wanted, thatâs the validation he was seeking (like Galadriel wanted the king of the Southlands).
This goes back to Adar in 2x06:
Adar: But sooner or later, he sees you. Not just who you are, but who you wish to be. His eye bores a hole and the rest of him slithers in. For a while, he even makes you believe that his power has become yours. Irresistible power... that makes every desire's fulfillment seem inevitable. An ocean of color against which everything else feels forever thereafter...
Galadriel: A dull gray.
Adar: What did he promise you? [...] Do you want to know what he offered me? [...] Children.
Galadriel: Then it would seem he gave us both what we desired.
Adar: You see, it is not his lies which must be extinguished. It is him.
And this is perfectly aligned with Tolkien religious message: sin, and the price to pay for being a sinner.
These characters are not âhopeless victimsâ of Sauron. They are active participants on their own torment by choosing to sin, and this is symbolically represented by them aligning themselves with evil (Sauron). This is pure Christian doctrine. The showrunners have to spin it into âmodern takesâ of âdomestic abuseâ or whatever for the audience to understand, but thatâs not the core message here. This is Tolkien preaching, folks. This is Tolkien saying âyou all need Jesusâ.
Adar and Galadriel parallel each other in a lot of ways, too. In Tolkien lore, Galadriel is described as ârepentant sinnerâ. And Adar is a repentant sinner, too, making amends.
In the legendarium, Galadrielâs sins are pride and greed (power hungry). And âRings of Powerâ built upon this and added a new one: lust. She turned her back on the Valar, and thatâs why sheâs banished from Valinor (heaven) in the first place.
Iâve read some speculating that sheâs not actually banished and only remains on Middle-earth because she wants to. But no, that doesnât fit Tolkien lore; the legendarium is fluid, and allows for multiple interpretations, but the core message needs to be there, all the same. Galadrielâs punishment for sinning is to be banished from heaven and she needs to repent to be allowed to return. This make complete sense with Tolkienâs work and his religious views.
But in âRings of Powerâ, Galadrielâs greed is also connected with her love for Halbrand/Sauron (and I already talked about this here). So far, we havenât see Galadriel expressing her desire to have a kingdom of her own; itâs Sauron that introduces this point, and heâs the reason why she refuses the Valarâs pardon and stays on Middle-earth, to begin with (to hunt him down).
Meaning: the reason for Galadrielâs banishment will have to be connected with Sauron in âRings of Powerâ, because thatâs the angle the show is exploring and working on, and they canât ignore her banishment because thatâs a huge deal in her overall characterâs arc, and why she becomes âLady of Lightâ and fights Sauron. When she rejects Frodoâs offer of the One Ring in the Third Age itâs her last temptation, and she humbles herself and proves to the Valar that sheâs worthy of returning to Valinor, at last.
And this leads me to another notion: catholic guilt. I was raised catholic in a extremely catholic country (itâs cultural), so I recognize many of Tolkienâs religious background on his work without trying (he, too, was a catholic), and the Tolkien experts of âRings of Powerâ seem to be heading in this direction, too, and that explains why Galadriel and Sauron have romantic and sexual chemistry, and thereâs so much sexual innuendo in their interactions.
A crown (clitorical symbol = vagina) penetrating a sword (phallic symbol = penis)? âRings of Powerâ canât get any more obvious than this with the Freudian symbolism.
âCatholic guiltâ is the deep feeling of shame after having sinned. This is often associated with sex, and having a high sex drive (usually females). And this makes perfect sense with the Eldar customs (sex = marriage; sex = children; and other puritan views of sexual acts), and why any Elf would feel deeply ashamed, guilty and in need of repenting for thousands of years (âcatholic guiltâ) after going against these rules.
What does this mean? Galadriel will get a taste of that D, sooner or later. And it makes more sense for it to happen when heâs fully Sauron (and not Halbrand), indeed. Because then, she canât racionalize it as âhaving been deceivedâ. And for that sense of deep shame and guilt to kick in, sheâll have to want it, too; it has to be consensual, on her part.
And for this sheâll be punished (banished from Valinor) and will have to repent for thousands of years into the future. Even if they donât explicitly say this on the show (which they wonât, not only they wonât go there but this religious message doesnât really fit nowadays standards). I highly doubt any this will be explicit, at all, but there will be innuendo, symbolism, and clues of this happening in future seasons. It might even happen in Season 3, actually (in connection with Galadriel spiraling down into darkness as a consequence of Morgothâs crown wound).
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