The "Well what next?" fox and The One Ring
""Hobbits! Well what next? I have heard of Strange doings in this land but I have seldom heard of a hobbit sleeping out of doors under a tree. Three of them! There's something mighty queer behind this".
He was quite right, but he never found out any more about it." Well, what if he HAD found out more about it? What if the prescient Fox had come into possession of The One Ring? |
I have to admit I was tempted to make this exact joke in the Treebeard thread but I thought it might come across as a bit much...
To take this unnecessarily seriously, I'm afraid to say that had the poor fox seized upon the Ring while Frodo slept, almost certainly the Ringwraiths would have found it, taken the Ring and ridden back to Mordor with it. Simple. |
http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pu...tefox_9155.jpg
That's what happens. Or maybe this: http://static6.comicvine.com/uploads...772-kybuui.png MB |
Yeah, I think the One was only a danger for Ilśvatar's Children and his created Ainu servants. Animals were immune to the One's lure.
That said, I'm amused by the thought of Goldifox, Lord of the Woody End bringing ;)in thrall all wildlife in Eriador. |
It's a silly topic, no doubt, but it's got me wondering... if it was by the hands of the small that the world was to be saved from Sauron and the One Ring, why stop at Hobbits? There are humbler creatures yet in Arda: why not have Bill the Pony or Acornamir the Forgotten Chipmunk of Ithilien as the heroes of the tale?
1. The obvious answer is that Hobbits are Children of Ilśvatar where animals are not, that they are thus more preferable instruments of Eru's will than the kelvar. 2. Another answer might be that as the power of the Rings most directly threatened the Children of Ilśvatar, so it was most appropriate that they were the ones used to destroy the Rings. 3. Or perhaps it is that the Children of Eru were the special enemies of Sauron (whose animus after all was directly more specially at them than at the whole of creation, unlike Morgoth's less focused hatred to end in the annihilation of all things). 4. Or you might say that Hobbits, as the least of the Children, represent the perfect balancing point between having something real to contribute and needing Eru's help to contribute it. Regardless, it is no doubt that case that Eru, under the following principle: Quote:
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However, given that this fox can think in complete sentences, perhaps I am underestimating its power. ;) |
Would you put it
in a box? Would you give it to a fox? Not in a box. Not with a fox. Not with a wizard. Not down my gizzard. I would not wear it here or there. I would not wear it anywhere. I would not wear the Dark Lord's bling. Please, no more posts about the Ring. |
Well, it certainly offers a new answer to the age old debates of 'why didn't the eagles fly the ring to Mt. Doom?' and 'why not just cast it in the ocean?'
After all, as the saying goes, ya can't trust an eagle... To say nothing of the fishes...! |
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Can people really not see what is wrong with that? The "Use the Great Eagles to fly it back to Mordor" has to be one of the worst ideas I can think of with the One Ring. It's doing nothing more than delivering the One Ring to Sauron by Air-Mail. The "Cast it into the ocean" makes only marginally more sense, but it still leaves Sauron alive, and mostly "Well." And a fish could eat the thing, get caught by some hapless fisherman, who then winds up using it and we are right back where we started. As for the Fox, Tolkien mentions in several places the distinctions between "mere beasts" (animals without Fėa), and those who could speak. And he admits that this threw himself a curve-ball. And it is another case of having to reference back to those "underlying postulates" and "coherent theological and metaphysical systems" again. To begin with: How would the fox use the ring having no fingers? Is the One Ring really so accommodating that it would stay on its Paw, should it decide to "wear" it? Why am I even thinking about this? MB |
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I'm sorry, but I just had to bring this up.
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The Fox just having the ring and never using it might not produce the more severe effects we see upon those who actually use it. And the Nazgūl seem to have had a harder time tracking it down unless it was actually worn. I can just see the Nazgūl with a pack of Spectral Fox-hounds riding through the Shire hunting the Fox who has taken the One Ring. As for the Bacterium.... Bacteria are immortal already. And what does an "Evil Bacteria" do, even? I'll take a look at the link... MB |
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