Tragic and Doomed

[deird_lj]

I think I've finally figured out why I don't like Aragorn and Arwen ending up together:

They're Buffy and Angel.


Seriously!

They're a couple who meet as teenagers well, when one of them is a teenager and the other one is already really old but immortal and seemingly young, and who promptly fall into an epic love story even though they're two completely different species, and get to stand around looking all tragic and doomed and heartbroken because they will forever be parted...

...and then they get married and live happily ever after.


Is it me, or is that sort of missing the point?


Buffy/Angel? Love it. Mostly. But the whole big idea behind their relationship is that it's tragic and doomed and heartbreaking, and they'll never end up together, and it's so beautiful and doomed and... doomed...


Aragorn and Arwen have a clear purpose - to be the Buffy-and-Angel, and look longingly into each other's eyes for a while before they go off and live their respective lives. That's how it's supposed to work! Having them end up together just doesn't fit.


(Which is all a long drawn-out way of saying: Aragorn/Eowyn 4eva! Woo!)

Comments

[rahirah]

She gave up her place on the last ship departing to the West, and once Aragorn died she basically willed herself to die. But I don't think she gave up her immortality as such; presumably her spirit would return to the Halls of Mandos for reincarnation just as that of any elf who died in Middle Earth would.

[elisi]

But I don't think she gave up her immortality as such; presumably her spirit would return to the Halls of Mandos for reincarnation just as that of any elf who died in Middle Earth would.
No - to quote Elrond when he first finds out that Aragorn is in love with her:

'But there will be no choice before Arwen, my beloved, unless you, Aragorn, Arathron's son, come between us and bring one of us, you or me, to a bitter parting beyond the end of the world.'

Actually, I think this is one of the ways that it works much better than B/A - Angel wants to be human (especially since otherwise he's doomed to hell etc), whereas Arwen has to give up her kind and an immortal life that is only good.