cirqueimaginaire:oopsabird:asktheoakenshieldbros:thranduil-elvenking-of-mirkwood:putasidethe
cirqueimaginaire: oopsabird: asktheoakenshieldbros: thranduil-elvenking-of-mirkwood: putasidetheranger: bowofthegaladhrim: goldengreenleaf: thranduilings: elizze-artemis-wolf: Seriously why even bring an army with you? It would have been less insulting if you led a group of birthday clowns! Then you’d have a freakin excuse to not help. Shmuck! He obviously came with every intention of helping the dwarves, but after seeing the chaos and all the dwarves fleeing in panic he decided not to risk his people (as they say in the movie) to attack the dragon. He saved his people from slaughter but that doesn’t matter because he didn’t sacrifice himself and his army to help the dwarves of course he is a villain. It’s great to see that we all can understand and judge his actions after 15 seconds of screen time. Pissed Sandra is pissed. Sandra, I love you. (( Do you know what happened to Thranduil’s father? No? Let me tell you. So there was this little battle called Dagorlad. Nothing major, just a little skirmish between the dark powers and the Last Alliance that basically saved Middle Earth for a time. There weren’t really any famous people there - just Gil-galad and Elendil and Sauron. You know, no biggies. Anyways, so at this time Oropher - father to Thranduil - was king over his little rogue group of Sindar. Gil-galad called him up and asked him to fight, and even though the woodland folk were badly equipped and only had very light armor, Oropher agreed. He and his troops marched down and joined the other members of the Last Alliance. But something went wrong just before the battle began. Oropher received a false signal, changed his mind, or was otherwise led astray. He and his men charged into the fray early - and were killed. Brutally. The vast majority of them never walked away from that battle field. The Elvenking did, however. And do you know what that means? That means that Thranduil watched his father and his family and friends being slaughtered because they charged into battle without thinking - and he got to live with that memory for the rest of his life. Fast-forward to Smaug’s attack on Erebor. Thranduil is now in his father’s place: he is king over the woodland realm, leader of an army that is perhaps better equipped than it once was but by no means a military powerhouse, and he has been called upon to fight and to protect a group of people under attack. Can you imagine what that was like, standing on that ridge? His father made one wrong decision at exactly that same moment in the battle of Dagorlad, and he and his soldiers were massacred. Knowing the pain that Oropher’s death had caused him, knowing the blow that the woodland folk had taken when those soldiers never returned, and knowing what it was like to be a son without a father in a culture in which people mate not only for life, but for eternity - do you really think he could make that same mistake and lead his people to their deaths? Do you think he could have left Legolas on his own, the way Oropher left him? Do you think he could have knowingly charged into the chaos and destruction caused by Smaug, thereby risking the lives of his people? The answer is no. Thranduil is not unjust, unkind, or cruel for not helping the dwarves on the day of the attack. As king, he is responsible for his subjects - and he protected them. There is nothing the elves could have done for the dwarves at this moment. Now, I’ll give you that the elves should have shown some more hospitality and help for Thorin’s kind after this - but here? Now? Any attempt at aid would only have led to more death. And it was not as if he was a dick and didn’t want to help the dwarves at all. He brought an army, after all. The Elvenking is not stupid - he would have known how much preparing, supplying, and transporting those soldiers would cost him - but he came anyways. He evidently had, as thranduilings said, every intention of helping the dwarves. But when he saw the situation, how could he have led his people into the fray in good conscience - especially when he saw his father die in the exact same way? So please, when you’re thinking about making a post about characters and how much of a ‘schmuck’ they are, consider the history. Thranduil is open to criticism for not giving aid after the battle was over and Smaug retreated to his new conquest but he cannot be condemned for saving his people from certain death on the day of the attack. )) ^THISSS ^^^^ That. THANK YOU I would add that he knows what happened in Gondolin and how the dragons wreaked wholesale destruction there. Going up against a dragon means you’re going to lose a lot of your soldiers at least. Dragons are hard to kill and once you piss them off? You’re in for shit in the long term. Thranduil lives in a forest. Do you know what burns well? Right! Trees. Also Oropher fled to the Mirkwood during the destruction of Beleriand during The War of Wrath. And that battle? Uh—the Valar went up against Morgoth and destroyed everything. Beleriand sank into the sea. Basically it was the Angelic host fighting the biggest demon, Morgoth, who makes Sauron seems kind of piddly. -- source link