Good Orcs?

[Telcontar_Dunedain]

Can you have good Orcs. You have evil men lik the Haradrim and Easterlings and you could easily have evil hobbit's, dwarves or elves. But the theory of a good orc doesn't sound plausible. Can you have them?

What about other evil creatures like trolls and Wargs?

[Halbarad of the Dunedain]

You can have Orcs who are more self centerd as was shown in Lord of the Rings. Orcs who don't want to be dominated by Sauron, but they will always be evil. The orcs in question from LotR wanted to leave Sauron and have their own land. Though orcs are always evil due to the fact thats how and why they were created, malkor created the orcs and the trolls in spite of the valar.

[Telcontar_Dunedain]

Orcs were created for evil, but men were created for good and some of them turned evil.

[Sister Golden Hair]

From Morgoth's Ring, Myths Transformed, Volume 10, The Histories of Middle-earth Series:

But even before this wickedness of Morgoth was suspected the Wise in the Elder Days taught always that the Orcs were not 'made' by Melkor, and therefore were not in their origin evil. They might have become irredeemable (at least by Elves and Men), but they remained within the Law. That is, that though of necessity, being the fingers of the hand of Morgoth, they must be fought with the utmost severity, they must not be dealt with in their own terms of cruelty and treachery. Captives must not be tormented, not even to discover information for the defence of the homes of Elves and Men. If any Orcs surrendered and asked for mercy, they must be granted it, even at a cost.* This was the teaching of the Wise, though in the horror of the War it was not always heeded

See this thread.

http://entmoot.tolkientrail.com/showthread.php?t=9238

[Telcontar_Dunedain]

So orcs were not evil to start out with. Were there any good orcs during the Third Age or by that time were they all completly twisted.

[Sister Golden Hair]

Originally Posted by Telcontar_Dunedain

So orcs were not evil to start out with. Were there any good orcs during the Third Age or by that time were they all completly twisted.

This is a very complicated part of the mythology that Tolkien changed his mind on. The thread link that I provided discusses this. They are evil, but since they started out from something else, be it Elves or Men, they would not have been originally evil, but corrupted, manipulated, and twisted into what we know as Orcs

[Lefty Scaevola]

Originally Posted by Telcontar_Dunedain

So orcs were not evil to start out with. .

They were not Orcs to begin with. They were bred, geneticly altered, and manipulated by Morgoth, Sauron, and later Sarumam from other races (but tolkien was back and forth as to what race or races, with no clear conclusion).

[me9996]

I think it would have to be a new breed (Or an ealry failed atemt).
But I think It is posable (After all, if a wizzard can swich sides why not an orc?)


From me9996 who is being chased be orcs!

[Beregond]

I don't think that you can get good orcs because they were created as evil. I also don't believe you get evil hobbits unless like gollum they are somehow corrupted

[Blackheart]

I think I have to agree. Within Tolkein's actual published material you can't make a definitive decision of what original stock orcs were bred from. As he often said, his characters don't know everything. (Which I think is one of his ways of glossing over inconsistencies)

That being said, I'm pretty sure Tolkein would have wanted it to be men, because he kept on with the themes of elevating those pansy-arsed elves to incorruptable status, and he had definate issues with industrialization and war, which are attributes of "men"... and the orcs certainly represent those attributes in the LOTR...

Maybe if he'd lived another 40 years he might have gotten his backstory straight.

You could make a convincing case for either elves or men, depending on how you want to view the "evidence"...

I just lump it all together and say they were bred from both. After all there's no difference in the DNA, just in the levels of "spiritual being"... It's no great difficulty to convince an orc, or pre-orc even, to nab some pretty elvish booty... It's what you do with the offspring that makes a breeding program a breeding program.

[ItalianLegolas]

maybe if you bred orcs with men or elves for many, many, many generations you could get a 'good orc', but that would be a genuinely stupid idea

[Lenya]

I deffinately do not think that you will ever find a good orc. There's no hope for them.

[me9996]

Originally Posted by ItalianLegolas

maybe if you bred orcs with men or elves for many, many, many generations you could get a 'good orc', but that would be a genuinely stupid idea

You're right about the first part (even though you'd get uruk-hai part way trough) but I don't agree on the 2nd. A good orc would only be of use in wartime (If they where any use ) but it would have to be a pletifill land to hold all thoghs good orcs (An orc has an exensive reporduction rate) so I gess you're right that no one in middle earth would bread good orcs.

(Enless it was a very long war and more solders were need )

[Lenya]

And who would they use as breeding stock? And what would they do with all the in between mutants? Very very very bad idee.

[Varnafindë]

I somehow doubt that Tolkien meant it that way, and guess that it was an oversight on his part - I would need to study Letters more closely to be sure.

As the text stands, that bizarre concept seems indeed to be the logical interpretation.