10 Reasons why Gandalf is a terrible wizard

For some reason or another, I recently decided to throw the Lord of the Rings films on, and while I was watching, it occurred to me: Gandalf is a terrible wizard. He’s terrible. Pants. Teh suck.

I know, you’re already arguing with me in the comments board in your mind, but allow me to lay it out for you. Gandalf is a “powerful wizard” and a member of “The White Council” and possibly a member of the “ACLU”. During the films, through other character’s actions and dialogue, we’re to believe that Gandalf is a figure of great importance and power. With that in mind, let’s take a trip through reality.

1. He’s almost undone before things get going

Admittedly, this is more to do with the power of the One Ring, and less with Big G himself. But come on. Gandalf isn’t that stupid, he had suspicions of what the ring really was, and still ended up in a position to be tempted by it at Bilbo’s place. A bit like an alcoholic visiting his friend’s place when he hears about a strange powerful liquid in a bottle. Ill advised.

2. Gets Suckerpunched by Saruman
Gandalf visits Saruman, another powerful wizard, and is totally cold-cocked by him. He might not have had reason to suspect Saruman, but that just adds to the evidence of lack of good judgement. Then he’s imprisoned at the top of a tower, escaping by talking to a butterfly. Yup, you read that right. The butterfly goes for help, gets a big eagle to come, and Gandalf is back in the game. Minus 2000 points for falling for that. My opponent can cause massive snowstorms, create a new life form, and transport me to a prison tower, but I can make the talky talky with the pretty Mariposa.

3. Gets Suckerpunched by Saruman AGAIN

Gandalf leads the Fellowship to the pass at Mount Caradhras, where, you guessed it, Saruman sends a big storm to stop their progress, dumping a mountain of snow on them. C’mon Gandalf, wake the hell up! Get your game together. You’re a super power wizard. Stop falling for this crap. Your opponent is really freaking old. You can’t out think him even once? In his defense, there didn’t appear to be any butterflies on the mountain.

4. Gets outsmarted by a hobbit

Okay, so after they get back down the mountain, they try to enter the mines of Moria, through a door near a lake. Apart from being surprised by the creature in the lake, which seems to be a theme for these guys, Gandalf is absolutely stymied by what is roughly a 4th grade level riddle. On the door, in Elvish, it says “Speak Friend and Enter”. Gandalf the Grey, of the White Council, Wizard extrordinaire, can’t suss this one out. They’re literally sitting around, waiting, until Frodo comes up with the obvious answer.

5. He’s kind of a dick, too
Okay, this is not a reason why he’s a bad wizard, but in general, he seems to have two responses to things: get mad, or be fooled by. In the mines, one of hobbits (Pippin, I think) knocks a suit of armor into a badly placed well/hole, causing a huge racket and alarming the Orcs and Trolls to their presence. He reams Pippin out, being a big jerk about it. I guess you’re the only one allowed to make huge mistakes endangering everyone, right G?

6. Didn’t watch his footing

When the party tries to escape Moria, they are confronted with a Balrog. Now, don’t get me wrong, Balrogs are pretty tough, and show up at inconvenient times, like when you’re fleeing Orcs, or right before you leave on summer vacation, when the car is packed and you’re LITERALLY walking back to it from locking up the house, or 4:30 on a Friday with a bunch of reports that it suddenly needs today, though it knew that this morning and could have said something then. Fucking Balrogs. Anyway, Gandalf decides to put this one down using gravity, by snapping his staff and breaking the bridge under its feet. Pretty good, redeeming himself a LOT here. But he takes his eye off the ball, and the balrog grabs his leg, and pulls him down into the pit. Gandalf has never seen a slasher film, obviously, or he wouldn’t have made this mistake.

7. Needs a second life

Okay, so Gandalf shows up again in the woods, and when asked how he can be alive, he tells the boys that he fought the Balrog for days and finally beat him, possibly through the use of a combo move. Then, he himself died, and went all Dave Bowman on us. Then “they” sent him back to put right what once went wrong, until he finally makes the leap home. Or something like that.

But, and this is just a theory, what if, he made all that crap up? What if he died when he fell, and then “they” rolled their eyes and shook their heads, and upped his power level, and threw him back in the game, hoping he’d be better. Really we only have Gandalf’s word as to what happened.

And better he was. Gandalf the White is able to take on Sauruman for the control of mind of the King of Rohan. Ha! Take that! Fool me twice, shame on me, but the third time I’ll probably win!

After that he pisses off again to rally some horsemen to arrive in time, or rather, a little bit late at Helm’s Deep. But, okay, he “saves the day”, for those still alive. After a bit of celebration, it’s back to get the hobbits at Isengard.

8. Leaves Ultra-Powerful Crystal Ball lying around

After Merry and Pippin find the Palantir in the wreckage of Isengard, Gandalf scoops it up in his cloak, in the fashion that one would use to say, clean a bowling ball. Then it’s back to Rohan for a night of drinking then off to bed for everyone. But does Gandalf put a protecty-type spell on the magic 8 ball? Nope. Tucks it to his chest, and goes to sleep with his eyes open (SUPER creepy, btw). A young hobbit is emotionally scarred due to this carelessness. As punishment, he is forced to continue to travel with Gandalf to Minas Tirith, where he tries to convince the Steward to raise his armies. The Steward is not impressed, but eventually does so.

9. Beats down a grieving father

When Denethor, steward of Gondor discovers his son is dead, Gandalf’s response is to cold-cock him, and assume control of the army. Now, aside questioning the generals of the Gondor army, who don’t seem to have any problem with this at all, we have to question this sort of behavior. We already know that Gandalf is kind of a dick to everyone except Frodo, but this one might be crossing the line a little. Later, when Denethor thinks his second son is also dead, and erroneously attempts to burn him on a funeral pyre at the top of Minas Tirith (and don’t even get me started on the design of this city!), Gandalf’s response is to trample the guy with his super-horse and “accidentally” knock him on to the funeral pyre, not bothering to pull him out in time to save his life. Poor Faramir. Wake up from huge injuries to see your dad, then realize he’s burning to death in front of you. To make matters worse, Denethor then runs off and falls to his death. That run covers a HUGE distance, the sort of distance a guy on a super horse could easily cover in time to stop him.

10. Total lack of Wizard Type actions in battle

Okay, so through the battle of Minas Tirith, and the following battle at the gates of Mordor, Gandalf does chop up some orcs with his sword. But where is the magic? Dude, you’re a White Wizard now. Give us a snowstorm, or a rolling lighting storm, etc. Hell, even a butterfly would be better than nothing. But that’s what we get. Nothing. This is the guy who fought a Balrog to death (allegedly), but he can’t even step up during the battle that can’t be won (oops, sorry that would be every battle in the film). He’s able to convince the giant eagles to fetch Frodo later, but not during the battle to mess with the Orcs? Where’s the shiny staff of a million lumens to take out the Nazgul? No, we’ll leave that for Eowyn, who is “no man” (insert eye roll here). Btw, the Witch King of Angmar has something in common with Rock Iv’s Ivan Drago. They both utter the line “I will break him” (give or take) with a straight face.

So there you have it. Gandalf starts out horribly, redeems himself a bit in the Two Towers, and sits most of the battle out in Return of the King. I’d recommend to our readers, if you’re attempting to re-watch the movies, you’d be well served to try the following: After the Fellowship is broken at the end of the first film, skip over any scene with Frodo, Sam and Gollum in it. The movies become MUCH better.

Dont forget to check out our “Travel Guide To Middle Earth” for some classic RobbieRobTown.

What say you? Defend your girly-man “wizard” below!

44 Responses to “10 Reasons why Gandalf is a terrible wizard”

1. Noah the Bleak says:

   March 28, 2011 at 11:42 am

   This is a completely unfair assessment of Gandalf and, I’m not sure, but it sounds like you haven’t watched any of these movies while not stoned. As a being of immense magical power, I find it easy to empathize with Gandalf’s situation. Simply because you have special abilities does not mean you are no longer human, with all accompanying weaknesses. Just having magic does not mean you are omnipotent, or even omniscient, and Gandalf’s power level goes from only 2300 to well over 10,000 during this particular quest. How is a grey wizard supposed to beat a white?!? If you know, please tell me because my neighbor has been pissing me off for years and I am sick of feeling so impotent when he’s around. Also, when you create an citadel of magic, you bestow immense power into it and get to call upon that power when creating snowstorms, mutants, or even lunch buffets. Gandalf only has a small citadel he carries in his pocket and doesn’t pull it out very often because of the strange looks he gets. A wizard is always sure of his footing. Being killed by the Balrog had the two pronged effect increased power at rebirth and psychologically forcing the fellowship to stop being so whiny. Left the crystal ball “lying around…”? This was all part of the master plan and seemed to work perfectly. Yes, Gandalf is a dick, but the steward was a pussy and we all know how that is supposed to go. As for #10, you’re right. But one last thing you are wrong about is that you’re supposed to skip any screne with Sam or Frodo right from the start, not only after the fellowship is broken

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   • devo342 says:

     June 27, 2012 at 9:46 pm

     wizards arnet human in loftr
     Noah the Bleak,

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2. soberirish says:

   March 28, 2011 at 12:02 pm

   My god you are right !! the Clerks 2 argument almost head me crossover but by god you have done it with this, and with the weird love tension between frodo and sam the luster on the ring is fading Thank god we have the wizards of Waverly heights they are hot…. she is not to young for me ..

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3. El-ahrairah says:

   March 28, 2011 at 12:45 pm

   Yeah, the Balrog thing always made me scratch my head…if I just fought off ten million orcs, trolls, and Satan’s whip-wielding nephew, as soon as that balrog fell, I’d be running for the exit which was what, 7 feet from where the bridge cracked?

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4. youdumbass says:

   March 28, 2011 at 1:06 pm

   someone has never read the books i see.

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   • admin_rock says:

     March 28, 2011 at 1:12 pm

     I’ve read them. However, this article is based on the film version. The multiple references to the films at the beginning of the article should probably have clued you in on that.

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     • Feanor says:

       March 28, 2011 at 3:55 pm

       @admin_rock, I think his point was that Gandalf isn’t really a “wizard” in the sense that we may think of them from Dungeons & Dragons or other fantasy novels.
       *potential spoiler* – Gandalf, Saruman, Radagast and Sauron aren’t humans with magical powers, they’re really more like powerful spirits that have taken the form of man. Where the balrog is a being of flame and shadow, Gandalf and the other “wizards” are beings of light, (even refered to by Tolkien as “an angelic being”), but they are corruptable, as seen with Saruman and Sauron.

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       • RobbieRobTown says:

         March 29, 2011 at 3:17 pm

         @Feanor,
         That is true. They are Maiar. I do a much better job of explaining this in my article.

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5. Critias says:

   March 28, 2011 at 4:02 pm

   Don’t forget about how homosexual the ending was when Aragorn was all, “Ehhhhhhhhhh….” and Gimli came in and went, “AH!” and Gandalf just stood there laughing psychotically. And Frodo is wetting the Elf bed and saying Gandalf’s name in a high pitched autistic fashion. That was my favorite scene.

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6. Jody says:

   March 28, 2011 at 4:17 pm

   Read the books.

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   • admin_rock says:

     March 28, 2011 at 4:26 pm

     Did. Have. Said That Already. Article (as clearly stated at least twice above) is about the films. Thanks for playing.

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7. FancisMH says:

   March 28, 2011 at 4:35 pm

   I agree with you.

   /and the books for the geeks.

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8. Nick H. says:

   March 28, 2011 at 4:56 pm

   A more apt title would have been “10 Reasons why ***THE CINEMATIC DEPICTION OF*** Gandalf is a terrible wizard”

   Re-read the books.

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9. Nick H. says:

   March 28, 2011 at 5:00 pm

   In fact, could you change the title? So it more accurately reflects the article’s content? And all of your readers aren’t expected to infer from your vague allusions that you’re discussing Gandalf from the films?

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   • admin_rock says:

     March 28, 2011 at 9:23 pm

     @Nick H., No. Your title above is terrible. C’mon I reference the films twice in the first two paragraphs. And you figured out that I was talking about the films, so what’s the problem?

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10. Rob says:

    March 28, 2011 at 5:50 pm

    I feel obliged to point out again that you should at least reference the bloody book .And given that your website is devoted to smarminess , I feel it completely appropriate to point this out for the thirdteenth time, despite your killer witty responses to the other commenters who did so.

    Ps- you got greenlit on Fark. The eye is upon you.

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    • RobbieRobTown says:

      March 29, 2011 at 3:19 pm

      @Rob,
      Whenever I reference the book, I lose 9/10 readers. I’ve made a couple of Tom Bombadil jokes over the years to no avail…

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11. chuck says:

    March 28, 2011 at 5:56 pm

    this was a waste of time reading. the article is titled “10 reasons why Gandalf is a terrible wizard”, yet you take only the most recent incarnation of the character and present half baked notions only to be contrary. i’m sorry you don’t have anything better to do than insult a character created by a man with more talent in his beard clippings than you display with your entire journalistic career.

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    • admin_rock says:

      March 28, 2011 at 9:27 pm

      @chuck, I know hey!!!! Surely there must be something we can do about this,someone we can call. I’ve got it…. It’s the Waaaaaahmbulance!

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12. SuperAndrew says:

    March 28, 2011 at 6:03 pm

    Gandalf was all sorts of lame. In the books, he was still pretty shitty. Wizards should do more than control big glow sticks.

    @admin_rock: i laughed quite thoroughly at all your replies. “Did. Have. Said That Already. Article (as clearly stated at least twice above) is about the films. Thanks for playing.” lol

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13. Sneakers O'tool says:

    March 28, 2011 at 6:47 pm

    So why didn’t the Eagles just take Frodo to Mt. Doom?

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    • Spiralmoomin says:

      April 4, 2011 at 2:53 pm

      @Sneakers O’tool, The Council of Elrond decided that secrecy and stealth were the only viable means of getting into Mordor. A large eagle in the skies would have been quickly spotted by Sauron and intercepted. In addition, the Eagles are an intelligent, independent race who cannot simply be summoned like beasts of burden, but who rather make their own decisions. Ultimately, they do decide to enter the war.

      It’s explained in The Hobbit that the only reason the eagles help Gandaf is because they owe him a favour. After being saved from Isengard Gandalf is 1 down on favours, hence the suprise when they decide to arrive at the end

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14. Jon says:

    March 28, 2011 at 7:04 pm

    This is crap….unless you review his actions from the books, don’t take it for granted that you know Gandalf at all.

    The books give a little more depth and reasoning for whats going on. The films had enough to draw in the Teenz

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15. John says:

    March 28, 2011 at 7:53 pm

    Don’t be so touchy! Reading the books is sound advice, admin_rock :b

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16. Stephen says:

    March 29, 2011 at 6:59 am

    Nice. Fan of the books, fan of the movies. I like this article though. Clearly intended to be humorous, it made me laugh. A member of the ACLU indeed!

    To those commenting, trying to base everything on fact…. um, time to put down the book, turn off the super extended special edition move, change out of that “mithril” shirt you got at some fantasy store online, take a breath, remove the stick, and get a giggle out of this.

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    • RobbieRobTown says:

      March 29, 2011 at 3:20 pm

      @Stephen,
      We’re not comfortable with people “getting it”, would you consider insulting is? We’re more at ease with that.

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17. Stephen says:

    March 29, 2011 at 7:00 am

    That’s actually something that I always wondered. All these magical creatures and abilities, yet, they make that poor hobbit and his friends walk that entire way into enemy territory. WTF mates?!?!

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18. spcMIKE says:

    March 29, 2011 at 7:36 am

    Hey, hey Dave. You know, maybe if like you read the books or something you might like understand that Gandalf was like secretly manipulating the events the entire time. That’s why he dispatched Chewbacca and R2-D2 to be secret rebel spies because Gandlaf knew no one would suspect a walking shag carpet and an astromech of really masterminding the entire rebellion.

    I mean first of all, do you know how difficult it is to understand Wookie? It is in fact a dialect of Balrog that developed once the Wookies moved to Kashyyk. And what is the deal with every one understanding R2? I recall that when I read the movie novelizations R2 had to have a translation program in the X-wing translate his whistles. He was probably talking shit most of the time he was around other people. I know I would be if if I knew that Luke was trying to bone his sister for two whole movies (and possibly still in the third one after he found out. I mean, I’m assuming she kept the metal bikini, you don’t just throw something like that away)

    Anyways, Gandalf wass secretly manipulating all the events of middle earth because Mr. Morden was acting as an agent of the shadows and trying to get John Sheridan to go Z’ha’dum, even though Kosh told him not to and hat he would die if he did. This led to an all out battle where the entire White Star fleet and the Rangers battled the Nazgul and some giant elephants.

    And then Lando blew up the death star a second time and Wedge is trying to tell anyone who’ll listen that he deserves credit because he was at both Death Stars and he took out the cooling tower in the second one and know one ever pays any attention to him even though he’s leader of Rogue Squadron and a better pilot than Luke because he doesn’t need to use the Force to make his shots.

    (And scene.)

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    • admin_rock says:

      March 29, 2011 at 10:15 am

      @spcMIKE, You need a newsletter that I can subscribe to.

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19. Tomass says:

    March 29, 2011 at 8:14 am

    @admin_rock WINS!

    Gandalf sucks it LARGE!

    Why and I putting my caps lock on for the last word in each LINE?

    …any how, Admin_rock way to win all over them, until it bubbled out there noses.

    Choke on Admin_rocks winnings beetchez!

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20. Smith says:

    March 29, 2011 at 8:32 am

    this article is crap, you’re not funny or even witty, it’s obvious you’re a casual fantasy enthuiasiast who just watched the movies or if you did read the books you didn’t absorb shit.. stop writing drivel like this.. Your blog sucks

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    • Tbinns says:

      March 29, 2011 at 4:42 pm

      Admin Rock, I’ll take this if I may.

      Smith

      This comment is crap, it’s not funny or even witty. It’s obvious you’re a casual Correctness enthusiast who just came over from Fark, or if you did read the articles here you didn’t absorb shit. If you don’t like it…stop reading drivel like this..your comment sucks.

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      • deepfriedcheese says:

        March 29, 2011 at 6:43 pm

        @Tbinns, Do you guys get a T-shirt for the best insult of a commenter? If so, you are in the lead!

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21. rizzo says:

    March 29, 2011 at 9:49 am

    A better way to watch the movies:
    Watch Fellowship and then skip the 2nd two live action ones and watch the animated RotK instead. The animated film captures the spirit of Middle Earth much better and contains 0% goddamn dwarf tossing.

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22. rooter says:

    March 29, 2011 at 9:56 am

    You only wrote this to piss off an army of geeks to bring traffic to your web site.

    Well played, sir.

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    • admin_rock says:

      March 29, 2011 at 10:14 am

      @rooter, This article was born of my watching Fellowship, and noting how often Gandalf screwed up. I was concerned when I watched Two Towers and he got most things right, seemingly destroying my thesis. The Return of the King came along, and my boy did me right again!

      Having said that, we always like a good nerd war.

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23. SeriouslyAGeekGirl says:

    March 29, 2011 at 1:02 pm

    Guys, come on…we all know that admin_rock can’t read, and I think that continually drawing attention to it like that is rather cruel.

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    • RobbieRobTown says:

      March 29, 2011 at 3:21 pm

      @SeriouslyAGeekGirl, We got Admin_Rock dictation software, but I think he assumed it was “be a dick-tation software”.

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24. intehsun says:

    March 29, 2011 at 1:56 pm

    Brilliant! Thank you for pointing out these character flaws in dear Gandalf (the film version). I couldn’t have said it better myself.

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25. Phroed says:

    March 29, 2011 at 2:12 pm

    How it should have ended…
    http://bcove.me/j5xj5lur

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26. Old Phart says:

    March 31, 2011 at 2:06 pm

    I read LOTR before most of you whippersnappers were born … and I think this sendup of Gandalf is hilarious!

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27. pariahlobo says:

    April 3, 2011 at 9:16 pm

    Gandalf is one of my favorite characters, and I wasn’t in the least bit offended by this post.

    When you said he defeated the Balrog, possibly by a combo move, I fell out laughing.

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    • admin_rock says:

      April 4, 2011 at 9:34 am

      @pariahlobo, There’s no room here for reasonable responses with no over-reaction. Try something like “Read the books, assdouche.”

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28. Lord Tryndal says:

    June 10, 2011 at 5:30 pm

    Yeah, so I don’t know if you guys have read the Periannath.com response to this, but uh, you’re kind of being harsh. In Tolkien’s world, “magic” seems to truly be an exhausting thing, and in the book he claims he is “already weary.” Picture this: you just broke a 500 pound block of stone carrying a huge frickin balrog on it, you’re already exhausted from running and fighting and (in the book) magic. You think you just defeated your enemy. Wouldn’t you pause for a breather? In any case, it is my belief that Gandalf chose to let himself fall, and thus have a chance to kill the balrog. I’m not sure why, but I think it has something to do with having dropped his staff and knowing he could no longer lead the fellowship without it. I believe that in Tolkien’s world you have to have a channel for your magic if you’re in mortal form, and he wasn’t likely to find a staff just laying around. Just a thought.

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