[Thenamir]

How about Middle Earth's biggest dupe - Frodo? Oh, sure, Gollum was abused, hung out, and left to dry; but he was a born fall-guy and a goober, anyway. But Frodo was grossly misled by the "wise" and "benevolent" entities present at the Council of Elrond (released straight to video). Someone says "send it to the Crack of Doom (patent pending)" and then they all stand around whistling and looking at their fingernails - I mean, here you have Elf-lords, and the Heir of Isildur (scalped, I imagine), and for goodness sake, a full blown, certified, card carrying Wizard! And who do they send? A halfpint, scrawny, and conveniently expendable hobbit! You can see it as a "win - win" for Gandalf and the elves - "oops, we goofed; guess we're wearied with Middle Earth now. Time to hoof it to the Havens and depart this sad land".

Then they hold up a winged hat and a stick, and - get this - a BROKEN sword to Aragorn, the "best and smartest" of all men, and he's gung ho to go! Hey, if the runt comes through he's king of it all - if the hobbit gets toasted and Sauron comes up tops, he can still (a) become a lieutenant (the promotion potential is quite good), or (b) take that ol' "doom of men" quaintly described as a "gift".

The dwarfs you say? They can profit either way, and can easily "dig in". Besides, they've no where else to go - no "elvenhome", no "gift", just dust in the wind (copyrighted). So launch a hobbit or two - who'll miss 'em? What the hey? Maybe it'll all work out okay - and if the bugger-hobbit claims the Thing, then he's easily booted around. Fiddle, even Sauron was "on their side" in that event, so to speak. All the hosts of Mordor, and such.

And lo! Frodo survives! How ... nice. How do we "reward" this hero of all free peoples? Why, we put him on a boat with the other, somewhat chagrined and embarrassed priciples and he's "never seen in this world again. No doubt! Wonder when they let him off in the concrete cloak? Imagine the tale of their brilliant exploits that they told when they got to Valinor, without a certain midget. Hopefully Frodo slept with Sting under his pillow on that voyage!