#add onto this and/or disagree idc have fun with it

[stitcherofchaos]

TBH my ‘vision’ of Maglor is more of a music nerd than any kind of drama queen fanon makes him out to be sometimes.

Like someone who just doesn’t see the political ramifications other people saw in his songs, when it really was just a good metaphor. Someone with messy hair and pulls it back without even brushing it before going to a royal festival. The geeky, melancholic version of Finrod in his own family. A Maglor so obsessed with music and words he thinks about the sheer art of the Oath’s words rather than the context within itself or what it entails. Someone who wasn’t aware of how the Noldolantë could have been taken the wrong way and didn’t even finish it before he vanished from history (or, who knows, he probably forgot to bring the lyrics written with him when the Gap burned), probably had a meltdown when he realized that he had lost it. Someone who loves music so much that, after all is finished, he fades while singing, because it was all he had left.

Someone who once had a joyful, innocent spirit which was brutally killed after he did.

[inthehouseoffinwe]

Ooooo love this!!! Adding on and agreeing to this and your tags op! Listen, I love a politically smart Maglor as much as the next person, as the son of the Crown Prince you kinda have to be. But I love the idea that his songs didn’t really cross his mind as a political tool until several years into Beleriand.

Even then it remained a passion. Sure, he’ll make a piece for certain occasions if it’s called for, but even his brothers don’t push him into that. Maedhros has only asked him to do so maybe two or three times? Because it’s one of the few things left from a time they can never go back to, and it’s something so *Maglor* they don’t want to turn that part of him into a weapon too.

Like with my siblings, there are certain things they do that I’d never ask them to turn into a rigid job, because it’s something that brings them joy and I don’t want to take that away from them. Especially during difficult times.

So yeah, the Fëanorions could do with him being a little more aware to the ramifications of some of his compositions, but everyone has their vices. The comfort from seeing him do something purely from his heart is worth more than anything else.

Moving into Maglor as a person, he’s good at violence, had to be to survive an Age of high stress battles. But it doesn’t seem to be as deeply rooted in him as his brothers, and singing is something he does on the daily without thinking too deeply on general impact. Including songs for battle. It’s just. What he does.

He thinks on the emotional power but not specifically as a weapon, but as a ‘what tune/words/etc work best for this moment. What seems right.’ Get me?

The Noldolantë was probably one such work. Created as a release for his and his people’s pain, a way to process everything that’s happened. Probably what helped him stick around for longer than Mae in the end. He’d already accepted everything he’d done, good and bad, long before we got to the end of the Age.

Maglor ultimately became a villain in the story and made some pretty messed up choices. But he’s not inherently evil, is specifically pulled out the narrative for his compassion and the redeemable aspects (as you mentioned in your tags) and that’s what makes makes him so interesting.

Especially when you consider Pengolodh as an in-universe narrator who highlights this softer more redeemable side, when Maglor should be despised the most as the survivor who partly led four kinslayings, without the saving grace of military victories against Morgoth that Maedhros had.

But yeah, Maglor’s such a fascinating character because we know so little about him. He exists silently in the background until very specific moments and it’s fun to play around with who he actually might be.

(Also, agreed. The only real similarly I see between Fëanor and Maglor is their passion for their craft. But specifically the passion a young Fëanor had, inventing for the sake of inventing.)

TBH my ‘vision’ of Maglor is more of a music nerd than any kind of drama queen fanon makes him out to be sometimes.

Like someone who just doesn’t see the political ramifications other people saw in his songs, when it really was just a good metaphor. Someone with messy hair and pulls it back without even brushing it before going to a royal festival. The geeky, melancholic version of Finrod in his own family. A Maglor so obsessed with music and words he thinks about the sheer art of the Oath’s words rather than the context within itself or what it entails. Someone who wasn’t aware of how the Noldolantë could have been taken the wrong way and didn’t even finish it before he vanished from history (or, who knows, he probably forgot to bring the lyrics written with him when the Gap burned), probably had a meltdown when he realized that he had lost it. Someone who loves music so much that, after all is finished, he fades while singing, because it was all he had left.

Someone who once had a joyful, innocent spirit which was brutally killed after he did.