altea♡︎

Thorin has had entire armies, soldiers that might have actually had a fighting chance at defeating a dragon, turn their backs on him and his people when they needed it most. He watched legions of armed elves turn around and walk away. Sometimes people treat Thorin’s anger like it’s irrational, but fuck, if I was in his shoes, I would be pissed off too. Like, if the guy I had a royal treaty, a contract with had the power to possibly save my entire kingdom, and then backed out at the last second, I would hate him too. like imagine being a young, relatively sheltered prince and seeing someone you trusted to come to the aid of your actively dying people, and feeling the hope leave your body as you realize no one is coming. and the elves were kind of your last hope against a fire breathing dragon anyways? so???? fuck????

(don’t get me wrong, I’m not blaming Thranduil for the fall of Erebor. like Thorin, he’s also another flawed character with immense depth, and is also extremely bitter due to his immense and emotionally insurmountable grief. the beef he has with the line of durin is complex and he’s not a villain, though some of his actions are objectively shit.)

(and at the end of the day someone’s gotta take the blame for all those dead people. Thorin takes most of it, because he’s the heir to the throne and is plagued by chronic Kingly Guilt (TM), but like. some of that is on Thranduil’s head too.)

and of course, we’ve got to remember that after the fall of Erebor, Thorin spent years toiling away in human villages, facing harsh racial discrimination, being treated like he was lesser than because he was another poor, wandering dwarf looking for work. he’s learned that true kindness is a rarity, and that anything good comes at a price.

Thorin’s anger is a product of what he has learned. he can’t trust the elves; they’re self-serving traitors. he can’t trust men; they’re cruel. he can only trust his own kind, and even then, not many dwarves are willing to put enough faith in him to help him regain his fallen kingdom. he’s all on his own, with the help of a total of 12 other dwarves, and he’s aware that he’s most likely going to get them all killed in this suicide mission of a quest. he’s prepared to die; he’s had to prepare himself for the possibility of all of the other dwarves dying, all of which have pledged themselves to his hopeless cause, including his nephews.

(small side note: if you take that into account when looking at Thorin’s reaction to Bilbo’s betrayal, it makes things so much worse. because trust and loyalty are such important things to Thorin, and for him they’re hard to come by, and I’m not articulating this well enough to get my point across but essentially I think that scene went down in the Worst Way Possible. because his heart basically got thrown back in his fucking face after giving it away when he found out Bilbo had traded the arkenstone and used it as a bargaining chip. I know I might be pointing out the obvious for some people but. fuck if it doesn’t hurt to think about)

and then this small, unassuming hobbit, at the very high risk of his own life, who will gain virtually nothing if he even survives the quest, is like. yes. I’ll help you.

this, in my opinion, is one of the best scenes to examine when trying to get a read on Bilbo’s character. Because in this scene, Bilbo shows an amazing amount of empathy. Bilbo extends his kindness to Thorin—a virtual stranger, at this point—effortlessly, for the very, very simple reason of “your situation looks like shit from all angles and I feel for you. you asked for my help, and I’m determined to give it to you not because I’m bound by my word but because i genuinely want to.”

like can you imagine??? after literal decades of being treated like a piece of unwanted trash, of being powerless to stop the suffering of the people you’re suppose to rule over, of asking for help and never getting it and constantly getting stabbed in the back over it, after hoping and hoping and having nothing come from it, this hobbit—this strange fussy creature who has only ever known comfort and peace—just. gives you his life and faith. just like that. he just believes in you so easily, decides to help you simply because he has morals and it’s the right thing to do.

and it’s even more crazy that Bilbo does this because Bilbo 1) could die and 2) he has never been outside the Shire and realistically has no reason to relate to Thorin at all, because Bilbo has lived a relatively quiet life free of suffering (save for the death of his parents cough). his response is just pure empathy.

It shows that Bilbo is just. inherently kind, and I think that’s beautiful, because Thorin hasn’t met a lot of people that are just kind to him for the hell of it in the 60 odd years he’s been exiled from his own kingdom. even Gandalf, the person who urged him on his quest, has his own agenda. so do the dwarves that have agreed to come with him. they’re all expecting a share of the gold, and while he has their loyalty, he knows they have their own doubts as to the success rate of the quest.

not Bilbo though. Bilbo’s just along for the fucking ride and seems to be totally cool with it now, even though Thorin knew he was thinking about leaving and abandoning the quest altogether not even a day earlier. From Thorin’s POV Bilbo has just had a sudden change of heart, and decides to keep sticking with the company even though he is clearly terrified.

and fuck. I know that bilbo’s speech probably scraped something raw and bruised in Thorin’s soul. you can’t tell me some younger, much softer part of him didn’t crumple like a wet paper bag in that moment.

and most people agree that Thorin really started properly gaining feelings for Bilbo after Bilbo literally threw himself at an orc to save him, which is totally fair. but I think it was definitely during this scene that Thorin became at least a little smitten with his burglar. (read: A LOT SMITTEN)