By the Rings of Power series so far, there are several glimpses of maps that have shown the Southlands in the lands next to what will later become Gondor and Rohan. But from the Lord of the Rings trilogy, and the hobbit movies, fans have come to know these lands as the dark place where Sauron and his orcs inhabit: Mordor.
The final episode of the Amazon TV show ended in devastation and ruin, when the orcs plan finally came to fruition and a large amount of water was dumped in the middle of the volcano that can be seen in the background of Tirharad. And with the ensuing eruption, the massive landform turned out to be none other than Mount Doom, meaning Mordor has finally come to Middle Earth.
The public got a glimpse of this very early on through the original trailers of the Rings of Power, which Galadriel showed in the wreckage of a burning village, bathed in red light and thick ash, and with the lava pouring out of the volcano in the latest storyline, it seems as if Tirharad is no more. Finally, several clues have culminated in the latest episodes, including the tunnels the elves had to dig, the orcs whose skin burned in the sunlight, and the leader Adar, who mentioned that he killed his children, the Uruks. gave him a house of his own.
Now it looks like they’ve accomplished just that, and the fire and destruction of Tirharad will continue to spread, until the surrounding lands become the recognizable barren wasteland of Mordor from the Peter Jackson movie adaptations. The people will have no choice but to flee to the surrounding lands of Rohan and Gondor to the west, where the Numenoreans will establish their kingdoms, and to Harad to the south, where they may meet a worse fate.
The 6th episode of the Rings of Power series was certainly a rollercoaster as defeat after win after defeat was about the heroes Bronwyn and Arondir. Using the shrewd tactics of destroying the tower, the villagers of Tirharad spent some time escaping and fleeing back to the village, which they then tactically set on fire to trap the orcs in their skull masks. And just when it looked like they had won and were finally released, they realized that the fallen orcs were actually their kinsmen who had sworn allegiance to Sauron and paid the ultimate price for it.
The real orcs then stormed into the village and forcibly seized the inn that housed the remaining villagers. It looked like they were all going to die, until the Numenoreans arrived and saved the day at the last minute by defeating the orcs. But even here, the first clue was given to the public that something was coming, as Valandir asks Ontanmo, “What do you think?” and he replies, “I love the mountain.” Little did they know that, within hours of that moment, that mountain would be their downfall.
Waldreg has long been a traitor, a coward, and a worshiper of the darkness of his ancestors of yore. He believed from the beginning that Sauron would return and become their redemption, and has suddenly taken on the task of making sure that happens. By stealing the enemy’s sword and entering it as the key into a vault, triggering a chain reaction that ended in the volcano’s eruption, Waldreg single-handedly caused four things: the death of several of his people, the Adar’s escape, Sauron’s imminent return, and a sunless world, blocked by the smoke and ash of Mount Doom, for the orcs to wreak havoc.
The orcs have already burned down villages, such as Hordern, where Bronwyn was born, as discovered in the first episode, but their movements are limited to nighttime hours because their skin burns in the light. Now, thanks to the intervention of Waldreg and Adar, they can spread across the land, turning them into the rubble of Mordor, as seen in Frodo and Sam’s journey to destroy the ring.
As the volcano, instantly recognizable as the iconic Mount Doom, explodes, the orcs chant “Udun, Udun”, the name of the 6th episode. Interestingly, in Tolkien’s works, Udun is the name of a desolate valley in Mordor, a minuscule part of the much larger plains stretching for miles as far as Sauron’s great eye can see. Udun was known for being created by volcanic activity, showing again that this little piece of destruction is just the beginning.
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