You know, the way you imagine a character’s appearance is directly related to how you interpret their personality.
From what we’ve read of Celebrimbor I think he was good-hearted, had a strong moral backbone, had a strong will, was hardworking, strong, brave, selfless, had a desire for knowledge & a desire for building, he was full of ideas, hopes, dreams & plans, he was open to everyone and was eager to make bridges & friendships, he was deeply lonely and alone & sad & he was determined to make up for the wrongdoings of his family & restore their name.
& I know it would underestimate Sauron’s deception skills but compared to the ‘the wise’ (Gil-Galad, Elrond & Galadriel) Celebrimbor looked rather naive.
So all the reasons listed above, make me imagine Celebrimbor as a very young man. (Other than the fact that elves don’t look old. But even among the elves some like Elrond at the end of the third age look “neither old nor young”. But I think Celebrimbor straight-up looked young. Like he was in his twenties.)
And you know, a youth full of hopes & dreams & plans & ideas, fighting alone & dying horribly under torture because he trusted and welcomed someone and because he was eager to learn & to build is a real tragedy.
That the Amazon series now can’t show.
Idk what they’re going to do with the character but as I said, how you imagine him to look is related to how you imagine him to be.
And how vastly different we imagined Celebrimbor to look, makes me think how vastly different we imagine his character is. So far, the only word the showrunners have used to describe him has been “mysterious”. Which is not at all what I’d use in a million years to describe Celebrimbor. What about him is mysterious?
And with “politically ambitious” Elrond & “brash” Galadriel…Idk I worry how they’re going to write him.
I keep seeing people say “ToLkiEn NeVER sAiD tHaT tHe ElvEs haD LoNG HaiR!”
Didn’t he?!
It seems like he very much did!
(Sources: The Nature of Middle-earth, The People of Middle-earth, The ring of Morgoth, Fall of Gondolin, the Fellowship of the Ring)
That short hair is not even historically correct! If you look at portraits of Northern European men before 18th century or watch period pieces you’ll see that they usually have chin-length or shoulder-length hair!
