[rushking]

I mean it is kind of lame when the main antagonist just sat in his tower throughout the book and even when he died, he still sat there.

[Jeroen]

I didn't have a problem with that.

Usually, the more you show of a monster (as a writer) or the more you define him, the less evil he gets for the reader. The reader's imagination can always make a more evil character.

But yes, sauron is probably one of the laziest villians ever. A few thousand years ago he stepped out of his tower, got his finger cut by Isildur, immediately died, went to sleep for some thousand years, rebuild his tower and stayed there untill he died again.

wouldn't be my life

[suupaabaka]

I agree with the less-is-more thing. An example would be a large number of Stephen King's villains; they hardly feature in his works until the climax, and as such convey more of a feeling of foreboding/dread to the reader. After all, people have an instinctive fear of the unknown.

To me, Sauron wasn't as much an active villain but a god of evil. Rather than emerging from his tower to slug it out with a bunch of hobbits, he dispatched his horde. In just the same way, Robert Jordan's Shai'tan sits idle while his agents carry out his bidding. Both are memorable villains, but more so because they don't actually do much.

A thought: Perhaps inactive villains are best for longer books/series, while active villains are better for shorter ones (and indeed, television/film)... Might be something to think about for aspiring writers.

[Takoren]

I mean it is kind of lame when the main antagonist just sat in his tower throughout the book and even when he died, he still sat there.
It seems to me that anyone who accuses Sauron of being "lazy" or "lame" profoundly misses the point of his character.

If I had never read the book and just looked at these posts I would assume that Sauron was built up throughout the book as some sort of Darth Vader-esque dark wizard whom the hero will have to fight, but who never leaves his castle for any reason, even though he could should he wish to. I would assume that the goal of the story was to fight through Orc armies to kill Sauron, that he was built up to be this impressive, powerful Lord that Frodo wouldn't stand a chance against, yet once Frodo faced down Sauron he just sat there and let Frodo kill him when he could have fought back. This is just such a wrong idea about Sauron.

Sauron is almost comparable to Satan. Just as Satan attempted to overthrow God in Heaven and was cast down to Hell for it, Sauron attempted to enslave the peoples of Middle-Earth by teaching them to make the rings of power, and then making his One Ring to Rule Them All. His goal was to corrupt the Lords of Men, Dwarves and Elves through their rings. With men, it worked. In his avarice he ended up having to invest the Ring with, essentially, his own life essence, so that the Ring, in a sense, became the Master. When Sauron had the Ring forcefully removed from him, he became a spirit. His physical body was gone.

One mistake people make about Satan is that he's some sort of "King of Hell". Not only is that not true of the Biblical Satan, it is also a mistake that people make about Sauron. Satan is as much a prisoner of Hell as anyone else is, and his only power is to corrupt mortal men. That is also Sauron's only power, and it is through that power that his strength comes. He managed to bind the Ringwraiths to his will through the Ring, he created Orcs himself and he was also able to corrupt the hearts of mortal men, both by satisfying their own lusts for power or making them believe there was no hope but to fall in with him. His sole power, after losing the Ring, other than to see great distances and communicate his will to his thralls immediately, was to put people under his thrall and corrupt them.

He was, by himself, weak and pathetic without the Ring. The true danger in LOTR was not that Sauron would reveal himself and kill Frodo, fight Gandalf to the death, etc. and quite frankly the suggestion that he should have revealed himself instead reveals that you did not understand the book at all. The danger, aside from invading Orc armies, was that Frodo, or indeed anyone, would fall under Sauron's thrall through the Ring's (Sauron's) corrupting influence, and that Sauron would manage to get the ring back and be able to take physical form and literally enslave the world.

Understand: Sauron was a threat, but as a force for corruption of the good, not as a physical presence. If all you wanted was a powerful scary wizard whose main threat was that he would kill the good guys, you had Saruman, the Witch King and the Balrog. There were also good men corrupted by Sauron's will like Boromir, Denethor and Grima Wormtongue (Saruman could also go on this list). Sauron was never intended to be the physical threat and you reveal your ignorance of the book by demanding that he should have become one.

[BrianC]

Sauron was a threat, but as a force for corruption of the good, not as a physical presence. And that's a very nice reduction of the entire point of LOTR into one sentence. For Tolkien the greatest evil was not the direct working of Satan in our world, but our human weakness and succeptibility to corruption. So, he made seduction Sauron's weapon, first through his beauty and poisonous persuasiveness (to convince the Elves to teach him the art of making rings of power, and in the destruction of Numenor) and later through his promise of power and dominion to his followers.

[Jeroen]

you guys are right offcourse. I was more or less just making a joke calling him lazy.

[rushking]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6IAYNYaNCz8

Well, at least Peter Jackson somewhat agrees with me. He almost made Sauron come out and play.

[thrinidir]

not showing Sauron is the most brilliant move Tolkien could pull.

[Ruggiero]

This is why I never loved Lord of the Rings. I think a fantasy series can never be better than how developed the antagonist is. I like to be able to understand, and, if not agree with, at least comprehend why their motives are the way they are. Sauron was like a big force of pure evil. I never felt that we got to truly understand him. It was just 'death and subordination to all life' for the sake of death and subordination. I guess I'd call it a lack of moral complexity. The characters don't have to think about the bad guys, or why they're doing what they're doing. It's obvious: they epitomize evil. Or, they don't have to deal with ameliorating things with their conscience (or being unable to) when they have to commit evil acts in the name of the greater good etc.

[Takoren]

This is why I never loved Lord of the Rings. I think a fantasy series can never be better than how developed the antagonist is. I like to be able to understand, and, if not agree with, at least comprehend why their motives are the way they are. Sauron was like a big force of pure evil. I never felt that we got to truly understand him. It was just 'death and subordination to all life' for the sake of death and subordination. I guess I'd call it a lack of moral complexity. The characters don't have to think about the bad guys, or why they're doing what they're doing. It's obvious: they epitomize evil. Or, they don't have to deal with ameliorating things with their conscience (or being unable to) when they have to commit evil acts in the name of the greater good etc.

So...unseen = undeveloped? God, you need to read The Silmarillion. Plus, while Sauron isn't the source of all evil on Middle-Earth, do you not think that evil has a source and that source is something other than pure evil? Evil has to have a source because there damned sure is such a thing as evil and everything that exists has a source. I, for one, am getting really tired of everyone leaping up to criticize any villain who is the way he is because his mother didn't cuddle him or something stupid like that. The fact is, power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely, and I don't just mean having power, I mean wanting it. This is true in real life and I don't see why it shouldn't be true in fantasy. The only way we can avoid becoming evil ourselves is to strive against our natural lust for power.