It isn't - people die (that near-suicide charge of Faramir's makes me want to shake him; and Theoden dying was very affecting) and get irreversibly injured (Xander's eye still makes me wince) and it just... sucks, even when it is for a good cause.
Theoden's death is actually a little different in this regard - particularly in what his death means to Theoden.
For him, death on the battlefield, at his age in particular, is the way to die, and his comment that he will go to his fathers and bear no shame is very much in keeping with old Norse and Anglo-Saxon tradition. (Which Rohan is heavily taken from.) But that stems more from the mindset on mortality itself rather than war in particular. What matters more to the view in this day, I hope, is what war and Theoden's death means to Eomer and Eowyn.
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regna
(no subject)
Date: 2003-12-21 09:09 pm (UTC)Theoden's death is actually a little different in this regard - particularly in what his death means to Theoden.
For him, death on the battlefield, at his age in particular, is the way to die, and his comment that he will go to his fathers and bear no shame is very much in keeping with old Norse and Anglo-Saxon tradition. (Which Rohan is heavily taken from.) But that stems more from the mindset on mortality itself rather than war in particular. What matters more to the view in this day, I hope, is what war and Theoden's death means to Eomer and Eowyn.