Gollum/Smeagol is a well known character from JRR Tolkien's Middle Earth, most prominently appearing in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, the former of which he played a small role in Riddles in the Dark with Bilbo Baggins and lost the riddles game and the Ring, the latter he played a much larger role in that was crucial to the survival and victory of The Free Peoples of Middle Earth in the War of the Ring. Despite being off putting and villainous in nature, Gollum, perhaps better referred to as Smeagol, played a pivotal role in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings and deserves being called one of the best characters in those aforementioned stories, so without further ado, let's see how potent this wretched creature truly is:
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Accolades
Whilst conversing with his other self (i.e. Smeagol), Gollum muses that with the power of the One Ring, he could become stronger than the Nazgul:
Not only does Gollum muse that he could become "stronger than Wraiths" but he also muses that he could become "Lord Smeagol" ... "Gollum the Great" ... "The Gollum!" and will able to "Eat fish every day, three times a day, fresh from the sea" which suggests that Gollum hasn't reached his full potential and that only the One Ring can unlock that potential.
Strength
Although it felt soft (which is easily attributable to Gollum's skin being tainted by poor hygiene), Gollum's grip over Samwise Gamee, is described as "horribly strong" and he squeezed Sam "like slowly tightening cords" during their first clash:
Speed
Samwise Gamgeee finds that an Gollum was "more than bargained before" despite Gollum "suddenly" being caught "off his guard off his fall" by Sam's surprise attack, and Gollum displays enough fast reaction to grab hold of Sam "before Sam could get a hold" of Gollum, indicating that Gollum is faster than Sam because Sam had the element of surprise in that he launched an unexpected attack on an unsuspecting Gollum that caught him off guard:
Durability
Gollum shrugs off getting head butted by Samwise Gamgee:
Might add more when I finally get time to rewatch all the movies and re-read all the books and idk when that’ll happen. Thanks for reading.