The Lord Of The Rings: 10 Things That Make No Sense About Saruman

In The Lord of the Rings, Saruman was Gandalf’s evil foil. While he was an intriguing villain, some things about him don’t really add up.

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The world of The Lord of the Rings is filled with powerful wizards and beings who can destroy their enemies with but a few words. Sauron is quite naturally one of the first names that springs to mind, with Gandalf being a close second. But Saruman is another powerful wizard who haunted Middle-earth.

One of the staunchest warriors against Sauron, he betrayed everything he believed in and turned his back on the world. Saruman’s defeat was the beginning of the end for Sauron’s conquest of Middle-earth. The traitorous turncoat did a lot of things that defied logic.

10 He Only Tried His Tricks Once

Like any other one-dimensional villain, Saruman has a variety of interesting and effective strategies he only uses once. For example, a solid plan was sending an avalanche to destroy the Fellowship of the Ring, which was a pretty baller move when you stop and think about it.

But why did he only try it once? They were stuck on the side of that mountain for a while when you consider that they had to double back. The avalanche may not have worked the first time, but he would have lost nothing by trying it 20 or 30 more times.

9 His Working Relationship With Sauron

Saruman turned his back on his friends and allies due to a mix of greed and fear. He desired power, which was what Sauron offered him. But Saruman was also genuinely afraid of the Dark Lord and rightfully so. The full arrangement between Sauron and Saruman was never fully detailed, though it’s highly unlikely that it was an equal partnership.

Sauron was never the type to understand that sharing is caring, and everyone in Middle-earth knew this. Still, Saruman worked for the dark lord. How Saruman fit into this working relationship with Sauron in a way that would have benefitted him at all has always been confusing.

8 Trusting Grima Wormtongue

When Saruman decided to infect King Théoden of Rohan and brainwash him into Sauron’s service, he brought Grima Wormtongue into the fore. Born and raised in Rohan, Grima was familiar with the king and his family. In particular, he was quite infatuated with Éowyn, Théoden’s beloved niece.

Grima played a key part in Saruman’s plans, keeping the spell over Théoden in place. Why Saruman trusted Grima at all continues to make little sense. He immediately seems like the kind of guy who would fold under the slightest amount of pressure, which was exactly what happened. Not only that but after smacking Grima one too many times, Grima stabs Saruman in the back in the extended cut of The Return of the King.

7 He’s Still Technically Saruman The White

When Gandalf died fighting with the Balrog, he was returned to life by the powers in Middle-earth that govern everything. He also received a promotion to Gandalf the White so he could combat Saruman the Jerk. But the big question here is why did the same powers or authority that resurrected Gandalf not officially demote Saruman or at least depower him?

He sure was doing a bad job in the role of being a White Wizard, so everyone would have understood if he had suddenly become Saruman the Grey or Saruman the Brown. Gandalf may have replaced him, but Saruman was still technically Saruman the White at the end of the day.

6 His Tower Looks Evil

At the center of the fortress called Isengard stood Orthanc, the imposing tower Saruman called home. Much like the tower Sauron’s giant glowing eye sat on top of, Orthanc was a dark and foreboding place long before Saruman turned evil. Frankly, his new attitude matched his home better than who he was before that life change.

If Saruman the White was supposed to be a beacon for everything good in the world, his residence was contradictory at best. Gandalf, on the other hand, appeared to be homeless.

5 Suddenly Losing His Powers When The Ents Attacked

Saruman finally pushed his luck too far when he tore down all of the nearby trees to help build and fuel his army building operations. The Ents took great offence to his actions especially since he killed many of their kind, so they showed up to kick his ass — which they did decisively.

The odd thing about that fight, though, was that Saruman didn’t get involved in it. He just ran around his balcony, looking worried. For a wizard who can create avalanches from thousands of miles away, he sure seemed to lose his powers for no apparent reason when they were needed the most.

4 Believing In Sauron

One of the stupidest, most nonsensical things Saruman did was trust Sauron on any level whatsoever. Regardless of the fear and greed driving him, Saruman was foolish to even consider believing that the dark lord Sauron — who’s basically evil incarnate in the story — would live up to whatever bargain they had made.

Gandalf even pointed this out to his former friend, but to no avail. Had everything played out the way Sauron planned, it’s incredibly unlikely that Sauron would have survived. Sauron would have killed him within moments of taking control over Middle-earth, seeing no more use for the wizard.

3 Picking A Fight With Some Trees

The Ents were an ancient race of tree-like beings who protected the ancient forests of Middle-earth. They chose to stay out of most, if not all, conflicts because they took the long view and big picture of such situations and saw little value in getting involved in the present.

That was until Saruman chose to piss them all off by cutting down large swaths of their forests to fuel his forges. Had Saruman not done everything he could to aggravate them even if inadvertently, the Ents would have likely kept to themselves and stayed out of the conflict. As a result, the Ents wrecked all of Isengard and effectively disabled Saurman’s war effort before he even knew what was going on.

2 Not Killing Gandalf The Grey

Saruman, being the status quo villain that he was, made possibly one of the most quintessential movie villain mistakes by letting the hero live. When the white wizard had Gandalf the Grey at this mercy, he trapped the good wizard on his roof and tortured him for a while.

This gave Gandalf the opportunity to formulate a plan, which featured an escape with the help of his trusty eagle. What Saruman should have done was immediately kill Gandalf when he had the chance, especially since Gandalf was considerably weaker than him at the time in terms of power and rnak. That would have kneecapped the resistance against Sauron.

1 He Didn’t See His Failure Coming

As a powerful wizard, Saruman was blessed with several amazing gifts, many of which should have alerted him to the fact that he was going tot fail miserably if he didn’t change his plans accordingly. Even basic common sense should have indicated that a partnership with Sauron would not end well for him.

Beyond that, several of the mistakes he made along the way could have been easily avoided, such as inadvertently angering the Ents by deforesting Isengard or not killing Gandalf the Grey when he had the chance to do so. Wizard powers or not, Saruman was the careless architect of his own failure, and could have easily prevented much of it from happening but being just a little bit smarter.

Link Source : https://screenrant.com/lord-of-the-rings-saruman-make-no-sense/