History YMMV / TheSilmarillion

* WhatMeasureIsANonBadass: Beren is certainly a badass, but his contributions to the quest for a Silmaril are... less than heroic (though no doubt courageous). He immediately gets captured (so Lúthien has to save him), had no plan on how to get into Angband (so Lúthien did it for him), got his stupid hand bitten off ([[RuleOfThree so Lúthien had to heal him]]) by Carcharoth, which also caused an epic wave of destruction in its wake, then later got his ass handed to him again by the same monster (so Huan killed it instead and Lúthien had to bargain with Mandos to bring him back). It's also important to remember that he was a mortal surrounded by gods, demigods and angels/demons in that quest. Prior to that, he [[OneManArmy fought a one-man guerilla war]] against Morgoth's forces for several years with only woodland creatures for allies, like some combination of Batman/Snow White. And he did it so well, his head was worth the same bounty as that on the High King of the Ñoldor. In a quest full of some of the most legendarily badass Elves on record, a GodOfEvil opposing them, and several unique beings that existed in this time only, it's hard not to be OvershadowedByAwesome.

** Sauron too especially since people got to see his first official fair form in the [[Series/TheLordOfTheRingsTheRingsOfPower Amazon show]], with a combination of EvilIcCool. No matter how abhorrent are his evil deeds, there are enough people who believe that his enemies and victims asked for it.

** So does [[BigBad Morgoth]]. Apparently, he looks like TheWoobie for some. There is even a major Russian fanfic, ''The Black Book of Arda'', that was even pirate-published as a book, that retells Silm from Woobie!Melkor's viewpoint. Alternately, Melkor and Mairon before they corrupted themselves into Morgoth and Sauron and [[PrettyBoy lost their]] [[{{Hunk}} good looks.]]

* MoralEventHorizon:
** Melkor, being the one responsible for the existence of evil in Eä (as it is, not just as a concept, but as a power. Evil in Eä comes from his power and his essence), had an entire existence dedicated purely to the propagation and expansion of evil and destruction. But to pinpoint a few examples in which he surpassed himself in malevolence:
*** Pouring his essence unto Arda, ensuring the world and the universe would be marred with evil until the end of its existence.
*** In the round world version, he ravishes Arien while trying to get the light given by her by Varda (who received it from Eru), ruining the sun and contaminating Arda with his act.
*** In the plane world version, the collapse of the two lamps.
*** Manipulating the Ñoldor against one another, seeding discord and mistrust, culminating in Fëanor raising his sword against Fingolfin. While this seems tame compared to many of his other acts, it must be considered that by doing it, he betrayed the trust of his brother Manwë, the Valar, and the Ñoldor, whom had decided to trust him and give him a new opportunity. Also, this would be the seed of many catastrophes which would occur in the future.
*** The destruction of the two Trees, the killing of Finwë, and the theft of the Silmarils. This is when Melkor is named Morgoth by the Elves and becomes irredeemable in the eyes of the Valar, who had given him an opportunity to repent himself, turning himself to evil forever (he had already done it in his heart long before, but this was unknown to Manwë).
*** His desire to rape Lúthien, is considered by Tolkien the evilest thought Morgoth ever had.
*** His cursing of Húrin and his entire family is Morgoth's pettiest act against anyone in Arda, and an absolute low for him. All for his wounded pride because Húrin stood up against him, defying him and calling him a liar. Also, tying Húrin for more than 20 years to a chair and forcing him to watch from Thangorodrim the lives of his children being destroyed little by little.
*** The creation of the [[WasOnceAMan Orcs]] is described as "the vilest deed of Melkor" and it's hard to think of any way he could have been redeemed after that.
** Fëanor crosses it when he leads a shocking massacre of the Elves who dared refuse him use of their ships.
** The best or rather worst examples from a side other than Morgoth's are undoubtedly Celegorm and Curufin, however. They [[SarcasmMode boast]] such great feats as: being the only Elves we know of to ever try [[RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil to force]] [[WorldsMostBeautifulWoman Lúthien]] to marriage and attempt to trample Beren and then kill him out of spite even [[UngratefulBastard after he spared their unworthy lives]], plotting to have Finrod (their first cousin on their father's side) killed so that they can take his kingdom, and actually ''encouraging'' the [[FinalSolution Second]] [[WouldBeRudeToSayGenocide Kinslaying]] as a direct result of failing to get Lúthien. And yet, after all that, they are still unquestionably, absolutely, utterly against [[BigBad Morgoth]] while [[EvilVsEvil being every bit as vile as his servants.]]
** Maeglin is known as the only Elf ever to betray his people and make a pact with [[BigBad Morgoth]] after being promised Idril's hand and led the Angband troops to Gondolin causing the destruction of the once indomitable city and the slaughter of lots of his fellow Elves. And even then he tried without any remorse to murder young Eärendil personally and fought Tuor until Tuor threw him into the ashes of the city that he caused.
** Sauron's whole existence in Eä was wrought with foulness and uncleanable atrocities against life, and as such, it is not possible to determine one particular deed. There are many egregious examples and the reference to them only attests to the futility of singling out just one:
*** Helping Morgoth create the Orcs.
*** Betraying Gorlim in an unnecessarily cruel and petty way.
*** Torturing Beren, Finrod, and their crew of Elves which ended with them feeding them to his werewolves one by one.
*** Deceiving the Elves into creating the rings. Which got topped by the brutal torture and murder of Celebrimbor who sabotaged this plan.
*** Corrupting and driving Númenor to destruction.
*** And all those are only the more individual reminders of the fact he was already the main lieutenant of Melkor/Morgoth, and helped wage a war against the Eldar and the Edain, collaborating in the mass-murder of hundreds of thousands of them, and that is before he rose again as the second Dark Lord, where he became responsible for all the evil things in the world for almost 6 millenniums. Tolkien himself pointed out that he was only lesser in evil to his master on account of serving for long someone else other than himself.
** Ar-Pharazôn usurps the throne of Númenor by [[RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil forcing the rightful Queen Tar-Míriel to marry him against her will]], and becomes a horrible tyrant, even before falling under the sway of Sauron. Afterward, he goes on to conduct HumanSacrifice to Morgoth in large numbers and ultimately makes war on the Elves and the Valar, resulting in the destruction of Númenor.

** Tar-Palantir, the last faithful king of Númenor. Though the narrative portrays him as [[HopeSpot the last chance the Númenóreans had to turn their society's decay around]] and blames the people for not immediately following him, he really doesn't do anything to reverse the corruption except hollow virtue-signalling, and despite claiming to be among the Faithful, he doesn't do anything to promote their side or refute the beliefs of the King's Men, even though he could easily have educated the people. Heck, the fact that Pharazôn made his fame in the army conquering Middle-earth before he usurped the throne himself means that Palantir didn't even stop Númenor's most obvious corruption, its imperialistic conquest and subjugation of the Men of Middle-earth. Not even Amandil and Elendil seem to oppose this, only opposing the paganism and literal HumanSacrifice, so even the Faithful took part in some of Númenor's corruption. On the other hand we know his brother Gimilkhâd was in rebellion against him and there was civil war in Númenor for most of his reign, so its just as likely he had no real opportunity to actually enforce his reforms while dealing with the King's Men. Heck the King's Men were already in control of the southern colonies(their descendants were still there as the Black Númenóreans thousands of years latter), so its equally possible Tar-Palantir had no control over their campaigns in Middle-earth.

* CrossoverShip: Some FanFiction authors have paired Maglor with [[Literature/TheChroniclesOfNarnia Susan Pevensie]], due to both characters being "lost souls" of unknown fates and the [[spoiler:sole survivors]] of their respective families, both being archers, and both having a sort of musical connection (Maglor being a great singer and Susan possessing a horn).

** One of the minor characters is an elf named Elmo. [[Series/SesameStreet We'll let that one sink in]].

** Fëanor, so much. He gets a ''lot'' of sympathy and apologetic fans for someone whose actions directly set in motion a series of events that led to so much suffering and death, including genocide and a world-shattering cataclysm. This is because as well as being an asshole, he was a total badass and unlike every other elf in the story, his life in "paradise" was full of sad occurrences like his mother's death, his manipulation by the local GodOfEvil Melkor and the murder of his father.

** Mîm the Dwarf. He sells out Túrin and the outlaws to orcs after he's captured and hates Beleg and the elves, but he's also the last of a dwindling people once hunted by the Sindar (they thought the petty-dwarves were animals until they met other dwarves), who loses his son, and did try to ensure Túrin wouldn't be harmed.

*** Manipulating the Ñoldor against one another, seeding discord and mistrust, culminating in Fëanor raising his sword against Fingolfin. While this seems tame compared to many of his other acts, it must be considered that doing it he betrayed the trust of his brother Manwë, the Valar, and the Ñoldor, whom had decided to trust him and give him a new opportunity. Also this would be the seed of many catastrophes which would occur in the future.
*** The destruction of the two Trees, the killing of Finwe and the theft of the Silmarils. This is when Melkor is named Morgoth by the elves, and becomes irredeemable in the eyes of the Valar, who had given him an opportunity to repent himself, turning himself to evil forever (he had already done it in his heart long before, but this was unknown to Manwë).
*** His desire to rape Lúthien, is considered by Tolkien the evilest thought Morgoth ever had.
*** His cursing of Húrin and his entire family is Morgoth's pettiest act against anyone in Arda, and an absolute low for him. All for his wounded pride because Húrin stood up against him, defying him and calling him liar. Also, tying Húrin for more than 20 years to a chair and forcing him to watch from Thangorodrim the lives of his children's being destroyed little by little.

** The best or rather worst examples from a side other than Morgoth's are undoubtedly Celegorm and Curufin, however. They [[SarcasmMode boast]] such great feats as: being the only elves we know of to ever try [[RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil to force]] [[WorldsMostBeautifulWoman Lúthien]] to marriage and attempt to trample Beren and then kill him out of spite even [[UngratefulBastard after he spared their unworthy lives]], plotting to have Finrod (their first cousin on their father's side) killed so that they can take his kingdom and actually ''encouraging'' the [[FinalSolution Second]] [[WouldBeRudeToSayGenocide Kinslaying]] as a direct result of failing to get Lúthien. And yet, after all that, they are still unquestionably, absolutely, utterly against [[BigBad Morgoth]] while [[EvilVsEvil being every bit as vile as his servants.]]
** Maeglin is known as the only elf ever to betray his people and make a pact with [[BigBad Morgoth]] after being promised Idril's hand and led the Angband troops to Gondolin causing the destruction of the once indomitable city and the slaughter of lots of his fellow elves. And even then he tried without any remorse to murder young Earendil personally and fought Tuor until Tuor threw him into the ashes of the city that he caused.
** Sauron's whole existence into Eä was wrought with foulness and uncleansable atrocities against life, and as such it is not possible to determine one particular deed. There are many egregious examples and the reference to them only attests to the futility of singling out just one:
*** Helping Morgoth create the orcs.
*** Betraying Gorlim in an unnecessarilly cruel and petty way.
*** Torturing Beren, Finrod and their crew of elves which ended with them feeding them to his werewolves one-by-one.
*** Deceiving the elves into creating the rings. Which got topped by the brutal torture and murder of Celebrimbor who sabotaged this plan.

*** And all those are only the more individual reminders to the fact he was already the main lieutenant of Melkor/Morgoth, and helped wage a war against the Eldar and the Edain, collaborating in the mass-murder of hundreds of thousand of them, and that is before he rose again as the second Dark Lord, where he became responsible for all the evil things in the world for almost 6 milleniums. Tolkien himself pointed out that he was only lesser in evil to his master on account of serving for long someone else other than himself.
** Ar-Pharazôn usurps the throne of Númenor by [[RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil forcing the rightful Queen Tar-Míriel to marry him against her will]], and becomes a horrible tyrant, even before falling under the sway of Sauron. Afterward, he goes on to conduct HumanSacrifice to Morgoth in large numbers and ultimately makes war on the Elves and the Valar, resulting in the destruction of Númenor.
* NeverLiveItDown:
** Isildur. He performed many great and heroic deeds in his life, not least saving the White Tree and defeating Sauron. Nevertheless the White Council (and real life Tolkien fans) remember him mainly as the man whose hubris allowed Sauron to survive, completely forgetting the good things he did before his MomentOfWeakness.
** Thingol was a genuinely [[ReasonableAuthorityFigure reasonable]] king who cared about his people and his wife and daughter, but most of his detractors come from his bigotry towards Men, and specifically sending Beren on a suicide mission, even though he learned his lesson and got better after that. His equally strong bigotry towards Dwarves, which eventually leads to his downfall, doesn't help.

** The DarkerAndEdgier narrative {{Deconstruction}} of typical fantasy novels. While they tend to be praised for subverting what seems like a simple good vs. evil story of Tolkien's writing, more often than not they're specifically thinking of ''The Lord of the Rings''. Reading the Silmarillion for the first time, several may be surprised to find a bleak, depressing story where the forces of good are fighting a slowly losing battle, several characters are some flavor of anti-hero or another, a distressingly large number of elves are imperialistic, genocidal racists that [[BlackAndGreyMorality still oppose the forces of evil]], humans fight to live short, violent lives in a world that's doing everything it can to kill them, and ambiguity and pragmatism is the rule, not the exception. Most coming in to read a prequel to a work that's commonly seen as somewhat simplistic and sappy nowadays don't expect a tone and setting more akin to ''Manga/{{Berserk}}'' or even ''Literature/ASongOfIceAndFire''.

** Azaghâl shows up in exactly one scene of the Silmarilion: during the Battle of Unnumbered Tears. And yet, his role (essentially saving Ñoldor from being wiped off the map by holding off ''an army of dragons'') is quite memorable.

* RealismInducedHorror: While ''The Silmarillion'' is not a horror story, Aredhel and Eöl's DestructiveRomance is a rather disturbingly accurate portrayal of how some actual abusive relationships function. Eöl puts on a [[BitchInSheepsClothing facade]] of being kind and helpful to draw Aredhel in, only starting to reveal his darker nature ''after'' they've married and had a child. He controls Aredhel by isolating her from the outside world and cutting her off from family and friends, forcing her to rely on him. When she does get the courage to leave he stalks her, tries to kill their son and ends up killing her (in the real world many victims of domestic abuse are at a higher risk of being killed by their partner when they're trying to leave).

* WhatMeasureIsANonBadass: Beren is certainly a badass, but his contributions to the quest for a Silmaril are... less than heroic (though no doubt courageous). He immediately gets captured (so Lúthien has to save him), had no plan on how to get into Angband (so Lúthien did it for him), got his stupid hand bitten off ([[RuleOfThree so Lúthien had to heal him]]) by Carcharoth, which also caused an epic wave of destruction in its wake, then later got his ass handed to him again by the same monster (so Huan killed it instead and Lúthien had to bargain with Mandos to bring him back). It's also important to remember that he was a mortal surrounded by gods, demigods and angels/demons in that quest. Prior to that, he [[OneManArmy fought a one-man guerilla war]] against Morgoth's forces for several years with only woodland creatures for allies, like some combination of Batman/Snow White. And he did it so well, his head was worth the same bounty as that on the High King of the Ñoldor. In a quest full of some of the most legendarily badass elves on record, a GodOfEvil opposing them, and several unique beings that existed in this time only, it's hard not to be OvershadowedByAwesome.

* FandomSpecificPlot: There are a non-insignificant amount of fics, thinkpieces and even fanart about {{Alternate Universe}}s where Tar-Miriel, the abused and [[TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodCharacter hardly-developed]] wife of Ar-Pharazôn, becomes the Witch King of Angmar.

** Ar-Pharazôn usurps the throne of Númenor by [[RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil forcing the rightful Queen Tar-Miriel to marry him against her will]], and becomes a horrible tyrant, even before falling under the sway of Sauron. Afterward, he goes on to conduct HumanSacrifice to Morgoth in large numbers and ultimately makes war on the Elves and the Valar, resulting in the destruction of Númenor.

** During the creation of the world, Melkor is constantly undoing the work of the other Valar. They raise mountains, he smashes them. They make bodies of water, and he fills them in. He was basically Arda's equivalent of a {{griefer}} on a VideoGame/{{Minecraft}} server!

** Túrin Turambar. They guy's life is basically a TraumaCongaLine (lost his little sister as a child, his father never returned from war, being sent away for his safety as a child, accidentally killing his best friend) but a good chunk of his problems are brough about by his own pride and stubbornness.

*** His desire to rape Lúthien, is considered by Tolkien the most evil thought Morgoth ever had.

** Sauron's whole existence into Ea was wrought with foulness and uncleansable atrocities against life, and as such it is not possible to determine one particular deed. There are many egregious examples and the reference to them only attests to the futility of singling out just one:

* MagnificentBastard: [[KnightInSourArmor Fingolfin]], [[TheHighKing High King of the Noldor]], is the second son of King Finwe and the first son of Finwe's second wife Indis. Believed to be the most martially skilled of his brothers, Fingolfin leads his host into Middle-earth, inadvertently participating in the massacre of the Teleri elves and committing his host over a dangerous trek that [[NominalHero sees many killed]]. Inheriting the title of King from his late brother Feanor, Fingolfin is the one to establish elven presence in Middle-earth and maintains a siege of Morgoth's capital Angband for four centuries. When the siege is broken, Fingolfin personally challenges the Dark Lord himself and shows his skill and tactical prowess, [[DyingMomentOfAwesome wounded Morgoth so before his own death]] that he suffers eternal pain from his wounds.

* CargoShip: Fëanor loves those Silmarils more than anything. So does everyone else apparently, even [[EvilOverlord Morgoth]].

** One of the minor characters is an elf named [[NamesTheSame Elmo]]. [[Series/SesameStreet We'll let that one sink in]].

** Tar-Palantir, the last faithful king of Númenor. Though the narrative portrays him as [[HopeSpot the last chance the Númenóreans had to turn their society's decay around]] and blames the people for not immediately following him, he really doesn't do anything to reverse the corruption except hollow virtue-signalling, and despite claiming to be among the Faithful, he doesn't do anything to promote their side or refute the beliefs of the King's Men, even though he could easily have educated the people. Heck, the fact that Pharazôn made his fame in the army conquering Middle-earth before he usurped the throne himself means that Palantir didn't even stop Númenor's most obvious corruption, its imperialistic conquest and subjugation of the Men of Middle-earth. Not even Amandil and Elendil seem to oppose this, only opposing the paganism and literal HumanSacrifice, so even the Faithful took part in some of Númenor's corruption.

* IronWoobie: Túrin Turambar.

* StrawmanHasAPoint: Eöl, as one of the Dark Elves who chose to remain behind in Middle-earth rather than sail West to the Valar, hated Fëanor and the Ñoldor who fled Valinor and invaded Middle-earth, and in doing so killed Elves of Eöl's kin and took their lands. Let's face it; a lot of the Ñoldor are blatantly racist and xenophobic towards pretty much ''all'' the races who either stayed behind in Middle-earth or awoke after the majority of the Elves left for Valinor. Even the more benevolent House of Finarfin are colonisers. As a result, Eöl refuses to cooperate with Gondolin or the other Ñoldor states, and allies with the Dwarves and (presumably) the Green and other Dark Elves.

** Tar-Miriel. Daughter of Tar-Palantir, apparently sharing his desire to undo the corruption of Númenor, and forcibly married to her evil cousin; you'd think she'd either be mentioned as using what influence she had to help the Faithful, or that it might be mentioned that she'd been broken into despair or actually turned evil. Instead she just vanishes from the story until it's mentioned that she was one of the many who died when Númenor fell beneath the waves.

** JerkassWoobie: Fëanor, so much. He gets a ''lot'' of sympathy and apologetic fans for someone whose actions directly set in motion a series of events that led to so much suffering and death, including genocide and a world-shattering cataclysm. This is because as well as being an asshole, he was a total badass and unlike every other elf in the story, his life in "paradise" was full of sad occurrences like his mother's death, his manipulation by the local GodOfEvil Melkor and the murder of his father.
** StoicWoobie: Maedhros. Being tortured at the hands of Morgoth and Sauron, losing a hand, most of his family (including Fingon, who meant a lot to him), and being the ''only'' known Elf to ever commit suicide qualifies him for woobie status. Letting absolutely ''nothing'' of this show through (aside from a few instances) got him the stoic part.

* AngstAversion: Coming off of the lighter tone of ''The Hobbit'' and ''The Lord of the Rings'', the darker tone of the various stories of ''The Silmarillion'' may be off-putting to some readers. A number of notable stories are outright tragedies (such as the War of the Jewels and the Children of Hurin), and the defeat of Morgoth comes at a high cost, with the setting of the stories sinking into the ocean, a large chunk of the world's beauty perpetually destroyed, and magic being much more diminished than before. And even then, Morgoth's influence will [[AsLongAsThereIsEvil continue to "mar" Arda until the end of time]].

** Curufin. What made him and Celegorm turn against their cousin in such heartless way? Was it fear of Morgoth and of the destruction of all the Elven realms - they were living as refugees with their people themselves at that point, thanks to Morgoth overpowering all the Noldorin might in the Battle of the Sudden Flame. Was it ego and pride of their elder house, and wish to see it restored back to power - as some of the Sons had not agreed with Maedhros turning down the crown of the High King.

* GatewaySeries: This is basically a rite of passage for any serious Tolkien fan. While not everyone who reads the book has the patience or willpower for the hardcore notes, family trees, conjecture, and scholarly work with ''Unfinished Tales'' or ''The History of Middle-Earth'', it's still a great crash course of the mythos.

** [[KissingCousins Maedhros/Fingon]], interpreting their story as a RescueRomance. That their story hits a lot of the same story beats as the tale of Beren and Luthien helps.

* MagnificentBastard: [[KnightInSourArmor Fingolfin]], [[TheHighKing High King of the Noldor]], is the second son of King Finwe and the first son of Finwe's second wife Indis. Believed to be the most martially skilled of his brothers, Fingolfin leads his host into Middle Earth, inadvertently participating in the massacre of the Teleri elves and committing his host over a dangerous trek that [[NominalHero sees many killed]]. Inheriting the title of King from his late brother Feanor, Fingolfin is the one to establish elven presence in Middle Earth and maintains a siege of Morgoth's capital Angband for four centuries. When the siege is broken, Fingolfin personally challenges the Dark Lord himself and shows his skill and tactical prowess, [[DyingMomentOfAwesome wounded Morgoth so before his own death]] that he suffers eternal pain from his wounds.

*** Manipulating the Noldor against one another, seeding discord and mistrust, culminating in Feanor raising his sword against Fingolfin. While this seems tame compared to many of his other acts, it must be considered that doing it he betrayed the trust of his brother Manwë, the Valar, and the Noldor, whom had decided to trust him and give him a new opportunity. Also this would be the seed of many catastrophes which would occur in the future.

*** His desire to rape Luthien, is considered by Tolkien the most evil thought Morgoth ever had.
*** His cursing of Hurin and his entire family is Morgoth's pettiest act against anyone in Arda, and an absolute low for him. All for his wounded pride because Hurin stood up against him, defying him and calling him liar. Also, tying Hurin for more than 20 years to a chair and forcing him to watch from Thangorodrim the lives of his children's being destroyed little by little.

*** Corrupting and driving Numenor to destruction.

** Ar-Pharazôn usurps the throne of Numenor by [[RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil forcing the rightful Queen Tar-Miriel to marry him against her will]], and becomes a horrible tyrant, even before falling under the sway of Sauron. Afterward, he goes on to conduct HumanSacrifice to Morgoth in large numbers and ultimately makes war on the Elves and the Valar, resulting in the destruction of Numenor.

** Azaghâl shows up in exactly one scene of the Silmarilion: during the Battle of Unnumbered Tears. And yet, his role (essentially saving Noldor from being wiped off the map by holding off ''an army of dragons'') is quite memorable.

* StrawmanHasAPoint: Eöl, as one of the Dark Elves who chose to remain behind in Middle-Earth rather than sail West to the Valar, hated Fëanor and the Noldor who fled Valinor and invaded Middle-Earth, and in doing so killed Elves of Eöl's kin and took their lands. Let's face it; a lot of the Noldor are blatantly racist and xenophobic towards pretty much ''all'' the races who either stayed behind in Middle-Earth or awoke after the majority of the Elves left for Valinor. Even the more benevolent House of Finarfin are colonisers. As a result, Eöl refuses to cooperate with Gondolin or the other Noldor states, and allies with the Dwarves and (presumably) the Green and other Dark Elves.

** Tar-Miriel. Daughter of Tar-Palantir, apparently sharing his desire to undo the corruption of Numenor, and forcibly married to her evil cousin; you'd think she'd either be mentioned as using what influence she had to help the Faithful, or that it might be mentioned that she'd been broken into despair or actually turned evil. Instead she just vanishes from the story until it's mentioned that she was one of the many who died when Numenor fell beneath the waves.
* WhatMeasureIsANonBadass: Beren is certainly a badass, but his contributions to the quest for a Silmaril are... less than heroic (though no doubt courageous). He immediately gets captured (so Lúthien has to save him), had no plan on how to get into Angband (so Lúthien did it for him), got his stupid hand bitten off ([[RuleOfThree so Lúthien had to heal him]]) by Carcharoth, which also caused an epic wave of destruction in its wake, then later got his ass handed to him again by the same monster (so Huan killed it instead and Luthien had to bargain with Mandos to bring him back). It's also important to remember that he was a mortal surrounded by gods, demigods and angels/demons in that quest. Prior to that, he [[OneManArmy fought a one-man guerilla war]] against Morgoth's forces for several years with only woodland creatures for allies, like some combination of Batman/Snow White. And he did it so well, his head was worth the same bounty as that on the High King of the Noldor. In a quest full of some of the most legendarily badass elves on record, a GodOfEvil opposing them, and several unique beings that existed in this time only, it's hard not to be OvershadowedByAwesome.

** [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earendel "Earendel"]] is an old Northern European name for a god or a star or something along those lines. It seems to be one of those words that stick in people's heads: names like Earendel/ Horwendill crop up in the oddest places, including the works of Creator/JamesBranchCabell and John Fowles's ''Literature/TheMagus'', and ''WesternAnimation/Frozen2013'', for that matter.

** [[KissingCousins Maedhros/Fingon]], interpreting their story as a RescueRomance.

* AccidentalInnuendo: The name of Curufin, it may not be obvious to English-speakers, but it has a funny meaning for Romanians. Curufin means "smooth/fine ass" as in "curu=ass" and "fin=smooth/fine".

** The DarkerAndEdgier narrative {{Deconstruction}} of typical fantasy novels. While they tend to be praised for subverting what seems like a simple good vs. evil story of Tolkien's writing, more often than not they're specifically thinking of ''The Lord of the Rings''. Reading the Silmarillion for the first time, several may be surprised to find a bleak, depressing story where the forces of good are fighting a slowly losing battle, several characters are some flavor of anti-hero or another, a distressingly large number of elves are imperialistic, genocidal racists that [[BlackAndGreyMorality still oppose the forces of evil]], humans fight to live short, violent lives in a world that's doing everything it can to kill them, and ambiguity and pragmatism is the rule, not the exception. Most coming in to read a prequel to a work that's commonly seen as somewhat simplistic and sappy nowadays don't expect a tone and setting more akin to ''Manga/{{Berserk}}'' or even ''Lkterature/ASongOfIceAndFire''.

** The DarkerAndEdgier narrative {{Deconstruction}} of typical fantasy novels. While they tend to be praised for subverting what seems like a simple good vs. evil story of Tolkien's writing, more often than not they're specifically thinking of ''The Lord of the Rings''. Reading the Silmarillion for the first time, several may be surprised to find a bleak, depressing story where the forces of good are fighting a slowly losing battle, several characters are some flavor of anti-hero or another, a distressingly large number of elves are imperialistic, genocidal racists that [[BlackAndGreyMorality still oppose the forces of evil]], humans fight to live short, violent lives in a world that's doing everything it can to kill them, and ambiguity and pragmatism is the rule, not the exception. Most coming in to read a prequel to a work that's commonly seen as somewhat simplistic and sappy nowadays don't expect a tone and setting more akin to ''Manga/{{Berserk}}''.

* CrossoverShip: Some FanFiction authors have paired Maglor with [[Literature/TheChroniclesOfNarnia Susan Pevensie]], due to both characters being "lost souls" of unknown fates and the sole survivors of their respective families, both being archers, and both having a sort of musical connection (Maglor being a great singer and Susan possessing a horn).

** Ar-Pharazôn usurps the throne of Numenor by [[RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil forcing the rightful Queen Tar-Miriel to marry him against her will]] and only goes downhill from there, ultimately making war on the Valar and causing the destruction of Numenor.

* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodCharacter: Ungoliant. She poisoned the Two Trees, devoured their light, produces an extremely potent darkness that could keep ''Tulkas'' at bay, nearly defeated Morgoth himself, survived the subsequent retaliation by the Balrogs, and mothered countless demon-spider hybrids (including Shelob). You would think these infamous deeds would qualify her as a major character in the story, right? Nope, she slinks off from the story [[KarmaHoudini unscathed]], and is never seen again. Instead, it's only speculated that she [[DroppedABridgeOnHim devoured herself later on]]. Then again, [[HesJustHiding she might still be holed up somewhere in the South]].

** The best or rather worst examples from a side other than Morgoth's are undoubtedly Celegorm and Curufin, however. They [[SarcasmMode boast]] such great feats as: being the only elves we know of to ever try [[RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil to force]] [[WorldsMostBeautifulWoman Lúthien]] to marriage and attempt to trample Beren and then kill him out of spite even [[UngratefulBastard after he spared their unworthy lives]], plotting to have Finrod (their first cousin on their father's side) killed so that they can take his kingdom and actually ''encouraging'' the [[FinalSolution Second]] [[WouldBeRudeToSayGenocide Kinslaying]] as a direct result of failing to get Lúthien. And yet, after all that, they are still unquestionably, absolutely, utterly against [[BigBad Morgoth]] while being every bit as vile as his servants.

** Fëanor crosses it when he leads a shocking massacre of the Elves who dared refuse him use of their ships.