Frodo Failed at Mount Doom, and Tolkien Said So in a Letter

At the Crack of Doom, Frodo says The Ring is mine, and Tolkien called it the failure of Frodo in a letter. So if Frodo did not destroy the One Ring, who did? In The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, Frodo Baggins reaches Mount Doom and claims the One Ring instead of destroying it, and J. R. R. Tolkien called it a failure in his letters, in a 1956 letter to Amy Ronald, a draft the day before, and a 1963 draft where Frodo 'gave in, ratted'. This video takes Tolkien's side and steelmans the other, with his own words that Frodo deserved all honour and that it was not a moral failure, then asks who really destroyed the Ring. The answer runs through Gollum and Sméagol, through Gandalf's pity speech, which Peter Jackson's The Fellowship of the Ring moves from Bag End to Moria, through Bilbo sparing Gollum, a moment Tolkien added to The Hobbit in its 1951 second edition and that The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey plays with Sting at Gollum's throat, and through Frodo's pity in Emyn Muil in The Two Towers. It also compares the book and the films on the moment Tolkien called the most tragic in the tale, Samwise Gamgee waking on the stairs of Cirith Ungol, and shows how Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens and Peter Jackson's screenplay moves that break to the Forbidden Pool. Every film line is from the Extended Editions' English subtitle tracks, and every Tolkien quote is from his published letters and the novels. Chapters 0:00 The Ring Is Mine 0:35 The Last Step 1:32 His Word, not Mine 2:25 The Best Case Against Me 3:29 The Line in Moria 4:27 He Chooses It Twice 5:13 The Most Tragic Moment 6:20 The Forbidden Pool 7:47 Who Destroyed the Ring More at Cutscene HQ: https://www.youtube.com/@watch-cutscene