Interesting view on Lord of the Rings

[Vandiablo]

Regarding:

Next time you re-read LOTR, count the number of examples... cases where powerful beings are vastly uglier than anybody with that kind of power would allow themselves to be.

King: Consult the Book of Appendices!

Brother Maynard!

Maynard: Appendices, Book A, Chapter 1, Section 1.

HolyBookBearer: *ahem*

...the Valar ... called upon the One, and the world was changed. Numenor was thrown down and swallowed into the Sea. ... The last leaders of the Faithful ... escaped in nine ships... and they were ... cast upon the shores of Middle-earth. ... For this good at least they believed had come out of ruin, that Sauron also had perished.

But it was not so. Sauron was indeed caught in the wreck of Numenor, so that the bodily form in which he long had walked perished; but he fled back to Middle-earth, a spirit of hatred borne upon a dark wind. He was unable ever again to assume a form that seemed fair to men, but became black and hideous, and his power thereafter was through terror alone.

King: Ah, so that is why he is one ugly bugger! Now explain to me, now, if Sauron and Ring together are so powerful, how did Gil-galad and Elendil get the Ring from him?

Maynard: skip a bit, brother.

HolyBookBearer:

Therefore, after a time (or a few times anyway, as the joke goes) he made war upon the Exiles, before they could take root. Orodruin burst once more into flame, and was named anew in Gondor Amon Amarth, Mount Doom. But Sauron struck too soon, before his own power was rebuilt, whereas the power of Gil-galad had increased in his absence; and in the Last Alliance that was made against him Sauron was overthrown and One Ring was taken from him.

Dennis: Well, I didn't vote for 'im.

King: Shut up!

-V
currently residing at The Forsaken Inn

(edit: fixed small typo in one of the book sections)