I still think about this story, and may eventually write some more. There are a couple of articles that made me think more about the setting, because it's a historian doing an analysis about what this the cultures of Middle-Earth believed from the writing they left behind, so to speak. Basically Dr. Deveraux's patrons forced him to watch Amazon's Rings of Power, whereupon he wrote a five part series on how this season failed on every level. But that's not the important part! On reflecting on the setting, he ended up writing about the internal values of the Arda, and Tolkien himself:
The first, Why Celebrimbor Fell but Boromir Conquered: the Moral Universe of Tolkien, explores how people's moral choices matter much more than their greatness -- and how the scriptwriters seem to have no clue compared to the fandom. Someone in the comments linked this post on SV -- the TL;DR is that someone asked what would happen if the 1860s era Union Army showed up as the only defenders of Minas Tirith, would they win? People went back and forth about whether they would be able to resist the fear attack of the Witch King, but then someone notes that Union soldiers have been bathed in the blood of the Lamb, posted a video of the Battle Hymn of the Republic, and flat out completely won an internet argument.
I think it's worth noting that we live in this same world, and even in times as dark as these, we need not have mortal fear from any power on Earth.
The second post is actually more interesting, How Gandalf Proved Mightiest: Spiritual Power in Tolkien. Magic systems! Finally, a clear explanation of how it works! While I think he uses Seen and Unseen somewhat wrongly here, that's kind of semantics. The moral universe can directly affect the physical universe, and simply stating the truth with power behind it is the core of Gandalf's magic. He also talks about elven craft-magic, for lack of a better term, which can do wondrous but not miraculous things.
This has very interesting connotations when viewed through Sailor Moon. For one thing, it means that the speech that Sailor Moon gives at the beginning of the fight is the deepest magic going on. Actually, it also means that we've been mistranslating Japanese to English all along, as well. Tsuki ni kawatte, oshioki yo doesn't have any pronouns at all, and Japanese future and present tense are the same. So maybe we should say, "In the name of the Moon, you are punished". And reality bends towards punishment, and hopefully reconciliation. Reality bends towards justice. It still takes work, because choices still matter.
The other point in the article talks a bit about dark magic, which is more or less a branch of celestial magic, but largely derived indirectly from Morgoth, from something or other he left behind, some dark lie that he introduced to the world. This is more or less exactly how BSSM gives out its dark powers, which are all ultimately derived from a being called Chaos. And it's certainly not a stretch for Metaria and Pharoah 90 to be fallen Ainur. Wiseman is basically doing the entire Sauron as Annatar schtick. Galaxia is the only mortal dumb enough to make a deal with Morgoth directly.
It also means that most of the miraculous powers, including most of the attack spells, likely come from celestial sources -- which I had already established in the first post was from the Valar. (Even though Sauron didn't corrupt the Three Rings, they still stopped working because they in some way relied on his presence in the world, his power.) Which means that if I'm going to make a magic punk setting on prehistoric Earth capable of reaching and destroying the Moon Kingdom, most likely it's going to run on dark magic. Perhaps with a bit of craft magic mixed in as well.
So Endymion is a prince of a civilization powered by dark energy, fallen Maiar tempting nations with more power and individual men with false visions of their own greatness. And then he falls in love with a girl. Endymion's end doesn't come in victory, but he still conquers, just as Boromir did. He let love and justice into his heart.
The first, Why Celebrimbor Fell but Boromir Conquered: the Moral Universe of Tolkien, explores how people's moral choices matter much more than their greatness -- and how the scriptwriters seem to have no clue compared to the fandom. Someone in the comments linked this post on SV -- the TL;DR is that someone asked what would happen if the 1860s era Union Army showed up as the only defenders of Minas Tirith, would they win? People went back and forth about whether they would be able to resist the fear attack of the Witch King, but then someone notes that Union soldiers have been bathed in the blood of the Lamb, posted a video of the Battle Hymn of the Republic, and flat out completely won an internet argument.
I think it's worth noting that we live in this same world, and even in times as dark as these, we need not have mortal fear from any power on Earth.
The second post is actually more interesting, How Gandalf Proved Mightiest: Spiritual Power in Tolkien. Magic systems! Finally, a clear explanation of how it works! While I think he uses Seen and Unseen somewhat wrongly here, that's kind of semantics. The moral universe can directly affect the physical universe, and simply stating the truth with power behind it is the core of Gandalf's magic. He also talks about elven craft-magic, for lack of a better term, which can do wondrous but not miraculous things.
This has very interesting connotations when viewed through Sailor Moon. For one thing, it means that the speech that Sailor Moon gives at the beginning of the fight is the deepest magic going on. Actually, it also means that we've been mistranslating Japanese to English all along, as well. Tsuki ni kawatte, oshioki yo doesn't have any pronouns at all, and Japanese future and present tense are the same. So maybe we should say, "In the name of the Moon, you are punished". And reality bends towards punishment, and hopefully reconciliation. Reality bends towards justice. It still takes work, because choices still matter.
The other point in the article talks a bit about dark magic, which is more or less a branch of celestial magic, but largely derived indirectly from Morgoth, from something or other he left behind, some dark lie that he introduced to the world. This is more or less exactly how BSSM gives out its dark powers, which are all ultimately derived from a being called Chaos. And it's certainly not a stretch for Metaria and Pharoah 90 to be fallen Ainur. Wiseman is basically doing the entire Sauron as Annatar schtick. Galaxia is the only mortal dumb enough to make a deal with Morgoth directly.
It also means that most of the miraculous powers, including most of the attack spells, likely come from celestial sources -- which I had already established in the first post was from the Valar. (Even though Sauron didn't corrupt the Three Rings, they still stopped working because they in some way relied on his presence in the world, his power.) Which means that if I'm going to make a magic punk setting on prehistoric Earth capable of reaching and destroying the Moon Kingdom, most likely it's going to run on dark magic. Perhaps with a bit of craft magic mixed in as well.
So Endymion is a prince of a civilization powered by dark energy, fallen Maiar tempting nations with more power and individual men with false visions of their own greatness. And then he falls in love with a girl. Endymion's end doesn't come in victory, but he still conquers, just as Boromir did. He let love and justice into his heart.
"Kitto daijoubu da yo." - Sakura Kinomoto