Lord of the Rings TV Series Purchased by Amazon

[Triceron]

I don't think it's that important how far the reinforcements are and how much time would it take for them to to come to aid (at least at that point in time). The tower would be night impossible to conquer by people who are not trained in warfare and do not posses some serious siege equipment - so I think we can safely assume the humans of the Southlands were never seen as an immediate threat, uprising or not.

See, that's where you're drawing a completely speculative conclusion though. The Humans wouldn't have to conquer the watchtower to carry on nefarious deeds if they were to do it the same was as the Orcs making tunnels without being seen by the Elves. Think about it this way - if the Humans loyal to Sauron had the guidance of Adar to work under the watch of the Elves, in many ways like Theo already does in finding that evil sword, then what would be the difference to what the Orcs are already capable of? They don't even need to capture the Elves considering they've practically waited them out long enough for them to completely leave. Had the intentional burning of villages been held off for say a month's time, the Elves would have been long gone from the area.

See how little sense there is in the plot overall? Everything is conveniently timed to support Arondir's story. Why have the Elves begin to leave the area? To build drama between Arondir and the Human female. Why are the orcs burning stuff now? Because the show needs a nefarious plot for Arondir to uncover. This is sadly how the narrative is being moved forward. It's all built around Arondir. The rest of the plot is very contrived when you consider how patient Adar has been shown to be with his tunnelling plans under the noses of the Elves. He could literally have kept them from burning villages until the Elves were gone and continued digging paths to every village before they even remotely attacked. But the show isn't really thinking about it from his perspective, it's all being built around Arondir instead, which is what leaves the motivations of other characters completely up to speculation and guessing, and prone to inconsistent or irrational decisions by them.

As for the tower's purpose - it seems that there was none, and wasn't it the reason why the elves were finally called back? It was a relic of old times, when the threat was real and the elves were afraid of Saruman's return. But obviously it wasn't happening, and the tower & the elves were there... because they were always there. This isn't THAT surprising, really; the tower had a purpose long time ago, that purpose was slowly diminishing. There always has to come a time when you deem something useless. The elves did that, calling the people back. We don't know the whole story & the past (and the show is slow enough without additional explanations of the history). One can assume that in the past, immediatelly after the war and Saruman's disappearance, the tower was only a single element of a bigger system, and with time, it was the only thing left. And the elves finally decide even that last thing is worthless.

Which makes the whole narrative purpose of the watchtower contrived. You're explaining how purposeless it is in the story overall for me. I don't even need to tell you how pointless it is to be the center of this narrative, you already realize it.

Why is the watchtower important in Rings of Power? Because they needed a reason for this Arondir Elf character to exist in the Southlands and a setting that makes sense for him to be established there. That is it.

The watchtower and the Elves stationed there are otherwise set up to fail. They were never really there to guard the place narratively, they are merely there to support Arondir's story and be fall-guys that make his story feel all the more tragic and dramatic. The way it's actually played out in this story , they're nothing more than security guards whose duty is to observe-and-report, and they aren't even able to observe anything useful until it's already too late.

[rhorle]

But a whole army would have also been easy to spot. Not to mention it also means they snuck around all the human villages. Similarly the humans also didn't notice this giant winding trench with its burnt forest.

Some did notice. Remember Arondir doesn't rely the rumor of poison grass. It is clear there is talk of strange things happening but the humans didn't want to tell the elves. Arondir takes that threat seriously when he sees the cow. Again Arondir fails to notify his garrison (or maybe they already left and he was awol.) The trench is likely something that didn't appear until the orcs were "found out" and they no longer had to be as secret. Hence why they were tunneling to villages at first.

Why does it have to be shown on screen to understand the Orcs are competent? It has firmly been established off-screen that they are a force to be reckoned with.

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Why have the Elves begin to leave the area?

When you make comments like these it makes me wonder if you actually watched the first episode. The opposition to Galadriels hunt indicates exactly why the elves are leaving the area. Arondir's own apathy to a potential threat shows why they are leaving the area. They are all complacent. The rest is you just attacking the show to attack. Of course the story will revolve around a main character. How many stories do not? Even Tolkien created things just to conveniently support his main characters.

Yet the show is bad for echoing Tolkien himself. Strange right? It is almost as if you dislike Tolkien and some of his writing style but refuse to speak ill of him. So you funnel it all on to the show because it is a derivative and won't have that author armor.

[DarkAmbient]

Watched all 4 eps, I am confused how it manages to look quite cheap.

The difference in visual quality between this and House of the Dragon is quite stark IMO. Different shows with different themes and aesthetics of course, but besides one or two slightly dodgy CGI moments I've not looked at HotD and thought it looks cheap. I'm not sure if cheap is entirely the right word either for RoP because it's clearly had a lot of money spent on it. Maybe things seem too pristine, and some live action scenes are too obviously in a studio and poorly integrated into the CGI backdrops.

[MCMLXXXII]

The difference in visual quality between this and House of the Dragon is quite stark IMO. Different shows with different themes and aesthetics of course, but besides one or two slightly dodgy CGI moments I've not looked at HotD and thought it looks cheap. I'm not sure if cheap is entirely the right word either for RoP because it's clearly had a lot of money spent on it. Maybe things seem too pristine, and some live action scenes are too obviously in a studio and poorly integrated into the CGI backdrops.

This is a criticism I completely agree with. While I don't know the difference between the budgets. So far HotD is miles high above RoP regarding visual quality.

[bledgor]

This is a criticism I completely agree with. While I don't know the difference between the budgets. So far HotD is miles high above RoP regarding visual quality.

I never got into GoT, but is HotD using more physical sets? Or does it have better CGI integration?

[Myradin]

Why does it have to be shown on screen to understand the Orcs are competent? It has firmly been established off-screen that they are a force to be reckoned with.

Because showing your villain as compotent, rather than "Firmly establishing" they're a threat off screen, is a good idea?

[Triceron]

So the show is staying true to the source material by having complacent elves be incompetent but the show is bad while the original author is good?

Tolkien establishes the capabilities of the Elves well before he shows them being outsmarted and incompetent. This gives them depth - that they are both highly skilled in capturing, but prone to having their weakness to wine exploited as well.

This doesn't exist in Rings of Power, and they don't establish the capabilities of the Elves at the Watchtower at all. At most you see one 'fight' scene where Arondir shows himself to be physically superior to a rude boy in a tavern, and that's it. Everything expected of the Elves is implied through an assumption of the show that people have watched Lord of the Rings and know how good they are at what they do. The show doesn't set this up at all for itself.

This shows the bias against the show when similar situations exist. Remember in the time period of the hobbit the elves thought Sauron was gone. It is how a large company of Orcs could show up on their doorstep unimpeded. Heck the "Watchful Peace" tolkien created even mirrors what is happening in the show. As garrisons there weren't kept up (the plague contributed as well). https://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/Calenardhon

And where have I defended these points? You're making some egregious assumptions here that you think I'm somehow defending every point of Tolkien's work as being flawless or something? If I haven't said anything to defend those points, I would prefer you not jumping to that conclusion and putting words in my mouth.

I will address them on a case by case basis as I have above with explaining the Elves being outsmarted by Bilbo and allowing the Dwarves to escape. If I haven't talked about the large company of Orcs showing up impeded, then I'm not showing bias am I? You're just assuming something that I never even commented on.

Right. Why is that a bad thing? Why is it that the only time it can be "good writing" is when the elves don't fail? That is counter intuitive because always having one side succeed just because they are the good guys is actual bad writing. There is no reason why there can't be failure and why "bad guys" can't be superior in some situations. Even more so when Tolkien did it and the show is echoing that.

The point is about establishing the Elves being capable before showing them fail. Without first establishing their power, if all we see is them constantly being undermined or failing, then that is how they will be portrayed forever in this series. Everything cool about the Elves is built on the assumption that people have watched the LOTR movies.

I'll say that I think your own bias that Elves are Capable is due to your own biases. Let's remember that you were the one who thought that Galadriel's team actually hit the Snow Troll, when they never actually landed ANY blows on the Snow Troll. I think if you actually watch the series over again, you'll see that Galadriel, Elrond and Arondir are the only ones who actually show off any real Elf skill, while every other Elf is shown to be incompetent or set up to fail.

[exochaft]

It's really hard to care about someones opinion when they can't even spell a name right.

Well, the name is rather accurate since she's basically written as what is popularly considered a 'toxic male' in the circle of these writers, but since she doesn't have dangly bits between her legs it makes it somehow empowering and acceptable for... reasons. I always think back and laugh at how the movie As Good As It Gets described this sort of female writing out years ago, and it became a mainstream reality:

[rhorle]

Because showing your villain as compotent, rather than "Firmly establishing" they're a threat off screen, is a good idea?

We do see the orcs displaying competence on-screen after their off-screen antics. What you are wanting to be shown on-screen has nothing to do with competence anyways. As we don't need to watch an entire valley be torn up and destroyed just to understand that a group can do it. It is silly to even suggest that is a requirement of any story telling.

[MCMLXXXII]

I never got into GoT, but is HotD using more physical sets? Or does it have better CGI integration?

They use more physical sets, all over Europe. I must say the integration of CGI in those physical sets don't look better then those in GoT but is far superior to RoP.

[rogoth]

Why does it have to be shown on screen to understand the Orcs are competent? It has firmly been established off-screen that they are a force to be reckoned with.

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When you make comments like these it makes me wonder if you actually watched the first episode. The opposition to Galadriels hunt indicates exactly why the elves are leaving the area. Arondir's own apathy to a potential threat shows why they are leaving the area. They are all complacent. The rest is you just attacking the show to attack. Of course the story will revolve around a main character. How many stories do not? Even Tolkien created things just to conveniently support his main characters.

Yet the show is bad for echoing Tolkien himself. Strange right? It is almost as if you dislike Tolkien and some of his writing style but refuse to speak ill of him. So you funnel it all on to the show because it is a derivative and won't have that author armor.

once again showing you have zero knowledge of the source material and zero understanding of it even if you know about it, during the second age and the rise of Sauron to power, the orcs were nothing but a mindless rabble, that's why in almost all other media set in this universe they are described as such and are viewed with little threat at all.

it was during the war of the last alliance that Sauron realised this immense weakness, while his army of orcs was vastly superior in number to that of the elves and men, it was a flailing mess with no focus on a singular goal which meant that the well drilled and well armed forces from the west were able to overcome that numbers disadvantage with skill and training, which is why in the third age Sauron had many MANY orc overseers who kept the mindless rabble in check and some who were given command on the front lines to mimic what was seen in ages past, (evil cannot create anew but only mimic that which is good), the orcs during this time period regardless of the wormhole jumps happening in this show should not be organised and cohesive at all, in fact they should be holed up fearing for their lives and eking a living out of whatever scraps they can find, until such a time that enough of them are gathered to form a horde, but i guess these details don't matter when the show has bastardised so much of the lore what's another egregious rewrite among a plethora of others right?

[Rageonit]

Like even IF we take a massive leap ignore the massive trench and the burning of the forest/towns

Mate, you're the one making the leaps here.
1. You claim that the elves should have seen the trench without knowing where is it and without understanding how far a human being can travel on foot in a relatively short amount of time.
2. You conveniently ignore the fact that the tower was surrounded by huge mountain ranges, limiting the view even more.
3. You talk about burning villageS while in reality we see ONE village being ransacked immediatelly before the elves being captured (we can still see it burning when arriving on the scene). Said village is also located in a damn valley, which means the smoke would've been rather difficult to spot.
4. You make it sound like the whole Southlands are burning and the elves are blind to it, when there's nothing to support that.
5. Also, a band of elves coming home with ZERO knowledge of the danger (in fact being absolutely sure there's NO danger) can indeed be ambushed, because why not?

[rhorle]

Tolkien establishes the capabilities of the Elves well before he shows them being outsmarted and incompetent. This gives them depth - that they are both highly skilled in capturing, but prone to having their weakness to wine exploited as well.

Again did you watch the show? We learn in the first part of the first episode that the elves spent thousands of years waging a war and even after victory spent a long time ensuring no trace was left. You are also incorrect about Tolkien as he never went into in-depth background about the full capabilities of groups and races prior to engaging them as part of the story.

And where have I defended these points?

Then why not attack Tolkien's work for those flaws instead of just the show? Isn't it strange how you leave out that the show is echoing the flaws of its source material. That is why you say you'll address them on a case by case basis because you are only interested in tearing down the show and not how the show depicts Tolkien's style of writing. Just like how you say for me to take a course on story telling when Tolkien does the things you are saying are bad story telling. Strange, right? That somehow you are such an accomplished writer that you know more then Tolkien the father of modern fantasy.

Why are you interested in this show if you think Tolkien told a bad story and a basic course on writing would have been able to fix his problems?

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Well, the name is rather accurate since she's basically written as what is popularly considered a 'toxic male' in the circle of these writers, but since she doesn't have dangly bits between her legs it makes it somehow empowering and acceptable for... reasons. I always think back and laugh at how the movie As Good As It Gets described this sort of female writing out years ago, and it became a mainstream reality:

I'm curious if you feel Tauriel was "a toxic male" because she wanted to fight evil while Legolas wanted to return home?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GuY384d7DEY

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once again showing you have zero knowledge of the source material and zero understanding of it even if you know about it, during the second age and the rise of Sauron to power, the orcs were nothing but a mindless rabble, that's why in almost all other media set in this universe they are described as such and are viewed with little threat at all.

Tolkien created huge auxilarry works to establish things off-screen from his main stories. Lmao. Also https://lotr.fandom.com/wiki/Orcs#Second_Age. Sauron had control of some orcs while others refused his leadership (at first).

[Lorgar Aurelian]

But his situation was pretty far removed from the others. Are we to believe they all discovered tunnels, jumped down, and got captured without telling anyone?

Not tunnels as such but it wouldn’t be. A surprise if they were also lead to investigate something odd and then got jumped.

We know that hey had orders to go Home so they could have just found something odd on the road.

[bledgor]

Mate, you're the one making the leaps here.
1. You claim that the elves should have seen the trench without knowing where is it and without understanding how far a human being can travel on foot in a relatively short amount of time.
2. You conveniently ignore the fact that the tower was surrounded by huge mountain ranges, limiting the view even more.
3. You talk about burning villageS while in reality we see ONE village being ransacked immediatelly before the elves being captured (we can still see it burning when arriving on the scene). Said village is also located in a damn valley, which means the smoke would've been rather difficult to spot.
4. You make it sound like the whole Southlands are burning and the elves are blind to it, when there's nothing to support that.
5. Also, a band of elves coming home with ZERO knowledge of the danger (in fact being absolutely sure there's NO danger) can indeed be ambushed, because why not?

1. I fully understand how far humans (these aren't humans btw, but elfs) can travel. We have no indication how far it is true, but obviously it is close enough for them to get to quickly, to tunnel to towns quickly, which means it is at most 1-2 days, and that is digging. Elves are supposed to see far, like miles far, they also have a tower to expand the distance they can see. Would they see tiny orcs no, but this is A MASSIVE CUT IN THE FOREST and trench, it would be visible for many miles, not to mention the smoke from it. You are telling me no elves noticed it for the weeks/months it would take to dig it? none of them ventured in that direction?

2. It wasn't surrounded by huge mountains, it has mountains on opposite sides. This also means btw they have less area to monitor/less areas for the orcs to hide as they aren't going over the mountains. This means more chance for them to run into the orcs as they are patrolling less area. This tower is also very fucking tall, like hundreds of meters tall/on a mountains edge. HOW DO THE ORCS SURPRISE THEM.

3. They mention others, but you do know SMOKE RISES. So a whole village burning would have had a lot of smoke rising form it, that would be visible from miles away. It wouldn't be hard to spot.

4. ... The show gives us an image of the "tunnel" being like over a mile long and hundreds of feet wide. That is a massive amount of trees that are shown burn, and since we have no reason to believe otherwise they apparently did tree burning the whole time meaning thousands of trees were being burnt. That isn't something small you ignore/don't notice. You are acting like it is some chimney fires, this is more like a controlled forest fire, it would be noticed.

5. All of them in a tower on a mountains edge are ambushed AND CAPTURED?

How far do we have to ass pull to make this somehow maybe kinda of make sense? Why defend this? Just admit it is pretty shitty writing, because it is. I mean if you are okay with this low a level of writing I guess more power to you, I expect better, especially from a billion dollar show, and double that expectation for something written by Tolkien.

Not tunnels as such but it wouldn’t be. A surprise if they were also lead to investigate something odd and then got jumped.

We know that hey had orders to go Home so they could have just found something odd on the road.

The issue with that then becomes they had to have tunnels/traps set near the tower/between the Tower and the north. Yet the humans all make it to the tower with no issues, meaning it would have to be in the north. This means orcs got around/past the Elves with none the wiser to setup a trap for them than then also captured all of them.

So either the orcs scouted the elves tower/routes without being seen or the have you heard of Sauron guy has other friends that report to the orcs/Adar. If they is the way they want to go, okay, but show more things that suggest treason/spies to lay the foundation for it. Also have a hard time believing the Elves who show such disdain to humans allow them to come up to their tower and map it out for orcs.

To many things have to go right to make this scenario work/logical for me.

[Triceron]

Again did you watch the show? We learn in the first part of the first episode that the elves spent thousands of years waging a war and even after victory spent a long time ensuring no trace was left. You are also incorrect about Tolkien as he never went into in-depth background about the full capabilities of groups and races prior to engaging them as part of the story.

Yes and we never actually see the Elves being capable here either. You see a bunch of them struggling, with Galadriel's brother having died there. We don't even see the victory really, we see the aftermath and implied victory all focused on its losses. Again, the entire tone of this show is built around the Elves failing. Even in victory, it's all focused on what they've lost. We don't really see Elves as being at a height of power until we see the city of Lindon, and even then its importance is all through exposition, not actually shown. The establishment of the Elves as being a power so far is quite underwhelming. And I'm saying this as objectively as possible as I'm trying to take in this series from the perspective of someone who has zero understanding of Middle Earth and sees what the show is trying to do to establish everything on its own.

So far, I don't think it's done a good job at world-building. It leans too heavily on expecting you to have watched Lord of the Rings, or being a casual viewer who doesn't think too deeply about the inconsistency of having Sauron marked an Elf with his mark thousands of years eariler that ends up being explained to be a map and a plan to be enacted on right now IF Morgoth happened to be defeated.

Then why not attack Tolkien's work for those flaws instead of just the show?

Because the topic of this thread is Rings of Power and not the Tolkien books?


Like what the fuck kind of question is that? Do you even know what the topic of this thread is? Or do you think I should be criticizing Game of Thrones and all these other fantasy settings here just so you can get a broader idea of where I'm coming from?

Rings of Power is beholden to itself, and its problems stem from lacking establishing its own world and lore. It builds heavily off the expectation that the audience must have watched Lord of the Rings to understand what an Elf or a Dwarf or a Wizard is. That is part of the problem I point out, because it doesn't do enough to establish these characters and their capabilities on their own prior to unfolding the story. They simply throw the characters in, sometimes in a way that subverts expectations (having expected you to have watched LOTR) and is quite unapologetic about it. And it ends up with the world building being a complete mess, with many of the inconsistencies being pointed out here.

Why are you interested in this show if you think Tolkien told a bad story and a basic course on writing would have been able to fix his problems?

Because this isn't Tolkien's story?

Rings of Power isn't written by Tolkien, and most of the narrative so far is completely new and has no bearing on the events in the appendices. The entire Watchtower and Southlands arc doesn't appear in Tolkien's work at all, for example.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

The issue with that then becomes they had to have tunnels/traps set near the tower/between the Tower and the north. Yet the humans all make it to the tower with no issues, meaning it would have to be in the north. This means orcs got around/past the Elves with none the wiser to setup a trap for them than then also captured all of them.

They don't necessarily have to go to the tower or even town it self the elves could have been caught mid travel away from the tower as we know they were going to leave when black elf went to go see his girl friend and they could have departed around the same time.

[rhorle]

Because the topic of this thread is Rings of Power and not the Tolkien books?

So you see no reason why the Author of the work the show is based on is relevant? Isn't it strange how here you are arguing the source material and Tolkien can't be referenced in a discussion about the show while at the same time others have complained that the show doesn't have enough of Tolkien and the source material? Lmao.

That is on top of your unrealistic expectation that a show has to define Dwarves, Elves, and offer a introductory class on its world prior to showing even the first episode. What show has every done that? Made its viewers an expert on its world prior to watching any or all of its episodes? This is again where your bias shows through because you are setting impossible expectations for the show then complaining when they are not met.

[Rageonit]

See, that's where you're drawing a completely speculative conclusion though. The Humans wouldn't have to conquer the watchtower to carry on nefarious deeds if they were to do it the same was as the Orcs making tunnels without being seen by the Elves. Think about it this way - if the Humans loyal to Sauron had the guidance of Adar to work under the watch of the Elves, in many ways like Theo already does in finding that evil sword, then what would be the difference to what the Orcs are already capable of?

You're ignoring one big difference here: the humans are being observed (for generations even) by the elves, while the orcs are not even known to exist. In all of those years of keeping an eye on the humans, the elves see nothing that would suggest they are cooperating with some malicious force (because, obviously, they don't). It would take a lot more cunning to deceive the elves while being observed than while living in the shadows, that's for sure. I highly doubt the humans we see in the show would be capable of that level of cunning, but that's just me.

And yes, some events are timed conveniently, like in most plots known to the humanity (Lord of the Rings - the book - has some convenient moments too, ie. the eagles appearing just in time, but not only). But the watchers being called back at that particular point in time is just a single facet of a bigger story arc of elves growing complacent and oblivious to threats. It's convenient, but it keeps the story succint (and the show's already slow in the first episodes), so I can live with that.

Which makes the whole narrative purpose of the watchtower contrived. You're explaining how purposeless it is in the story overall for me. I don't even need to tell you how pointless it is to be the center of this narrative, you already realize it.

But why would the tower need any more reason to exist? Was it said somewhere that it's central to the plot...? Why would you give that tower more meaning than it has to have? Surely, there are plenty of towers in the world; this particular one has an important character manning it, so we get to know a bit of its story. Is it so difficult to believe that there is a tower in the world that had some importance in the past, but with time, lost most of it? Is it difficult to believe that the elves would leave a small unit there "just in case", even though there was no immediate threat? I mean, if there was a war somewhere in the world and the elves would send half of their army to a tower in the middle of nowhere, that would be rather sketchy, but it's a time of peace - surely you can spare like five people to man a tower (until you decide there's no point anymore, like they do in the show?). Every made-up world has a history we don't need to know in detail, so why do you make so much fuss about a tower manned by a handful of soliders of no real importance? Does every tower have to have an important meaning?

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5. All of them in a tower on a mountains edge are ambushed AND CAPTURED?

Do you even watch the show, mate? When Arondir and Bronwyn travel to the village, Bronwyn asks Arondir where are the other elves and he replies: "They are probably looking for me" (or something to that extent), because they were supposed to leave already. So no, they were not in the tower.
I'll end it here, and you let me know when you actually watch the show.

[bledgor]

They don't necessarily have to go to the tower or even town it self the elves could have been caught mid travel away from the tower as we know they were going to leave when black elf went to go see his girl friend and they could have departed around the same time.

Hence my north comment, as I believe the tower is in the northern end of the valley between the two mountains. Unless the orcs tunneled through mountains or went all the way around/over, they would have to tunnel/travel near the tower to get past them for a trap. The other option is the orcs are located between where the elves/southlanders are and the north, which I would struggle with too.

Like I said a few posts up, if instead of capturing all these elves they had Arondir's buddy tell them they fought a fierce battle and many elves died, but he believes some got away to warn others, I am okay with it. Repeating myself, but then you have him suggest they need to escape because the orcs are in wildly larger numbers than expected/tunneling which is worrying since the Elf reinforcements will be expecting a dumb band of orcs in the open and could get ambushed. This also allows you to have your mini helms deep moment (as much as I dislike it) with the reinforcements at dawn but watchers have some foreshadowing rather than having to fill in every gap and full on ass pull later.

Do you even watch the show, mate? When Arondir and Bronwyn travel to the village, Bronwyn asks Arondir where are the other elves and he replies: "They are probably looking for me" (or something to that extent), because they were supposed to leave already. So no, they were not in the tower.
I'll end it here, and you let me know when you actually watch the show.

So now I have to infer that Arondir saying "they are probably looking for me" means hours after he left EVERY elf went looking for him and got ambushed? No they wouldn't possible send his one buddy who has been working with him/knows him well to find him? The others don't have to pack up supplies/get ready to move out of the tower? REALLY? Okay mate, lets just agree to disagree, cause you are making my brain hurt. I have watched the show, I just don't turn my brain off when I do.