TheDrunkNinja said:
Whereas, with Shadow of Mordor (my bad for getting the title wrong originally), this "spirit of vengeance" business really doesn't fuck with anything already established. Possession by an spirit is a new idea that hasn't been touched upon in the series. It could work just fine canonically as well as tone-wise, and it is kind of inline with the books considering undead spirits, wraiths, and wights are not without presence in Middle-earth. I mean, an entire army of undead specters was a major plot point in the last Lord of the Rings movie.
No, it doesn't.
No resurrections take place in his work and go against what he wrote, especially about Men.
Only one reincarnation took place with Glorfinel and only because he was an Elf and thus his spirit never left Ea and lingered in the Halls of Mandos, but he was a unique event and only because a quirk in Tolkien's personality and his refusal to give two Elves two separate names when he realized he'd given two the same name when Elfish names are unique.
Wraiths like the Nazgul did not die and were more liches like than anything while those in the Barrow-Downs were servants of Sauron who were sent to inhabit the Barrows and disrupt the local area.
The Dead of Dunharrow don't apply. They swore and oath and then broke it. They died but were not allowed the Gift of Men, to pass on beyond Ea like all Men, Hobbits and Dwarves are given (which is an extremely crucial and important facet of his overall work and a key theme) until they fulfilled their oath and were then released from it when they did do so.
In all cases none were brought back to life, and in the case of Glorfindal, he was given a second life, but it was a one time event.
This kind of silliness is why I loath works which aren't protected like Tolkien's work, they decay into comic book crap where they're constantly reinvented and the worlds fundamental rules are constantly rewritten to churn out my tripe. While Warner Brother's is able to do this, at least everyone knows to pay lip service to the weight of the work instead of fools arguing over Superman, DBZ, and other tripe.