I think the reason so many LOTR ripoffs fail is because they make their Aragorn analogue the main character, when the entire point of Aragorn is that he’s “the person the villains think is the main character, but is Not.”
Aragorn seems like a traditional King Arthur style hero— he has huge Main Character Energy because he’s supported by destiny, by bloodline, by all these magic artifacts and prophecies, and etc etc. Frodo and Sam are Just Some Guys. Aragorn recognizes that Sauron understandably thinks he’s the main hero of this story ….and he pretends to believe it too, spending the entire series using himself as a diversion to prevent Sauron from seeing Frodo and Sam.
Aragorn’s whole thing is that knows he seems like the Main Hero of this legend to people who don’t know better —- but he also knows that he isn’t, and that his role is just to keep Sauron’s eye on him in order to protect the people around him.
And it works! Sauron is so fixated on defeating his Legendary Destined Archenemy with Extreme Main Character Energy that he completely overlooks the two ordinary little guys who were the real threat to him all along.
