Message in a Moth
Gandalf’s love for the longbottom leaf is well documented.
A good friend of mine has this theory that Gandalf barely has any power at all, and that he is instead a “light-bulb wizard.” If you look closely most of his performed magical feats involve more light than magic:
- His staff gets shiny when he defends the Balrog’s flame-sword
- His staff gets glows at the top when he hits the The Bridge of Khazad-dum. Is it just the Balrog’s weight that breaks that bridge? I think so.
- When we first meet him again in The Two Towers we can’t see him because of all the light.
- As he descends on the fifth day, he shines a light from the tip of his staff.
- In the final film, he flashes some light to save the riders from the Nazgul.
Shiny shiny. Would a light-bulb on the end of a stick be so different? My friend has a good point, I feel.
Now let’s ask ourselves why this great wizard is “lighting up” all the time. Why is all of his power in blazing up the end of a stick? Just let the jargon and implied metaphors wash over you until you feel acceptance. Essay concluded bitches.
this comic is shit hot awesome. i guess that comment is somewhat self serving, but i don’t care.
hahaha! I need to watch LOTR again, it’s been a while! The extended edition blu rays are coming out in January!
But he zaps the Balrog with lightning and exorcises Sarumon from Theoden. He would have to have more then just light to do that. (i’m such a nerd XD)
You bring up some very good arguments, but we are going to need to watch those scenes again. We have a feeling lots of it is just fancy pyrotechnics and just plain old “being in the right place at the right time” :-)
“The Hobbit” disputes all of that
Are you basing this entirely off the movie adaptation, or are you trying to make an argument about the actual Character Gandalf taking the series as a whole?
In the latter case: while he does actually do a lot more than just some stuff with lights in the Lord of the Rings itself, if you read The Silmarillion (Tolkien’s longer, and primary, work about Middle-Earth that makes the Lord of the RIngs seem like a minor scuffle) you’ll find (towards the end) that there is much more to Gandalf than explained in The Lord of the Rings which would refute such claims.
But, probably an easier thing to do is read Tolkien’s letters to his publisher (or maybe an appendix or prologue or something, don’t remember) which is included with many copies of the Silmarillion in which Tolkien explains that really neither Gandalf nor Elves (nor, I believe, the two other ‘wizards’) actually use magic at all, but rather have some sort of more direct natural or spiritual creative force. From what I can remember its a bit questionable whether Sauron even uses magic.
Nice comic though.
I’m really only saying Gandalf is a light-bulb wizard to upset automaton. But it is pretty cool to learn that wizards and elves are really just using a spiritual or creative force. Thanks for the comment!
you’re an asshole. and it worked. i’m upset still, like, a year later.